Asleep at Dawn
by The Unplanner
Summary: Organization XIII was defeated, Kingdom Hearts was destroyed, and the Time Breaks are all closed, but it's too early to celebrate. Unfortunately, it's also to early to send the newest Keyblade wielders off to war. Can Kairi, Lambda, and Xion stop tripping over each other's weapons in time to stop the Keyblade War?
1. Sleep Without Trouble

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 1: Sleep Without Trouble**

 _ **-"From the King?"-**_

 _Summary: Organization XIII was defeated, Kingdom Hearts was destroyed, and the Time Breaks are all closed, but it's too early to celebrate. Unfortunately, it's also too early to send the newest Keyblade wielders off to war. Can Kairi, Lambda, and Xion stop tripping over each other's weapons in time to stop the Keyblade War?_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: Here it is, the three-quel you've been waiting for! ...Almost the three-quel you've sort of been waiting for!_

 _Those who've played_ Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance - _and hopefully that's almost everyone reading this; if not, go play it! It's awesome! - you know what comes next: Sora and Riku have to be tested for the Mark of Mastery. This...is_ not _the story of their journey through the Sleeping Worlds._

 _In_ Silver Linings _, several potential Keyblade wielders joined the ranks of the heroes: Lambda, Kairi, Xion, and Roxas. However, of those children (Kairi's actually the oldest at just 15 years old; no matter how you slice it, the others are all less than a year old), only Roxas has enough ability with his dual-wielding Keyblade style to stand up to any flunkies of Xehanort right now. Xion has to reacquire a real Keyblade - having lost hers to self-doubt - and Lambda and Kairi are more likely to trip and land on their Keyblades than win a fight with Xehanort. As Captain Shang once put it in Disney's_ Mulan _, "We've got a long way to go."_

 _Luckily, Yen Sid, Merlin, and the three good fairies have a plan to train the new Keyblade wielders quickly enough to join the inevitable fight._

 _Formatting Information: Section breaks are indicated by a line of bold_ **V** _'s, as usual. Italic text could be used for emphasis, or to indicate the mind of Kingdom Hearts providing an info blurb, a character's thoughts, a memory, or someone speaking while they're not physically present in the scene. (In cases where two of these things happen at once, half of them will be underlined). _**Bold** _text is the consciousness of a Keyblade or other sentient weapon, such as a Nox Nyctores. If there's **bold, underlined, italic text** , that's probably someone yelling really loudly._

 _Now, enough with the waiting! Of course, this first chapter takes place before Mickey's letter arrives, so there isn't much action yet._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Destiny Islands: Market..._

"Don't take too long! The burgers will get cold!" Selphie waved to Kairi, Xion, and Lambda as they split off from the rest of the group. Kairi was adamant that Lambda and Xion had to get at least one new outfit each, to replace the ones the other two girls had literally been wearing all their lives.

"Kairi, I don't really need another outfit," Lambda muttered as she was dragged along. Kairi had a really strong grip, especially for someone who had never fought anyone or even worked out before the climactic battles against Organization XIII earlier that day.

Kairi didn't slow down. "Yes, you do, and that's final. You're walking around barefoot, which isn't good for your feet, and even though that bodysuit covers everything it's supposed to, you're practically indecent."

Lambda argued, "I have auto-repair capabilities that fix the wear on my feet, and my bodysuit is designed to literally be worn forever. It uses my auto-repair to clean and fix itself. This bodysuit is pretty much the most practical garment ever created, period!"

Kairi just rolled her eyes and pulled harder. "Maybe that's true, but you still look like you're walking around naked. And all that hair is no substitute for pants or a skirt. You'll need to tie that up somehow." Kairi lifted one of Lambda's knee-length, blonde hairs to demonstrate; the bio-mechanical girl's copious hair fell against her back like a soft blanket, although one short lock of it still stuck up and curled forward over the top of her head. "Besides, we're here!" Kairi pulled Lambda and Xion under one of the awnings at Destiny Islands' big, open-air market.

Xion walked in more willingly than Lambda. "It's no big deal, Lambda. I think it'll be fun to go shopping with friends!" The Organization had a Moogle from whom they could buy supplies, but living in the Castle That Never Was was always so tense and businesslike, no matter what one was trying to do.

Lambda hesitated, causing her to stumble as Kairi dragged her along. "But this is the only thing I have left from the Azure Timeline. All the rest of my clothes, accessories, and weapons disappeared, except this bodysuit and my gloves. Even if I don't need to go back there, I don't want to just forget that the other universe exists. Plus...I don't actually know how to remove the suit. I mean, it must be possible, since I'm supposed to float in a tube for heavy repairs, but there's no zipper or anything. I'm going to have to find some workaround to repair myself without the tube..."

"You're getting off-topic," Kairi interrupted.

 _"Just wear the suit under something else,"_ Namine pointed out. The blonde Nobody's voice echoed from Kairi's heart, where she now resided. _"It isn't a hard concept; Kairi's wearing three layers of clothes right now."_

"...Oh. Now I feel really stupid." Lambda let Kairi drag her into one of the few shops in this open-air market that had a real roof and walls.

Fifty minutes later, all the girls emerged in their new outfits.

"Don't worry, you both look great!" Kairi had on the same outfit as before, but she'd bought duplicates of every article and was wearing the new ones. Everything she wore was a little shinier than before.

"I still think it was unnecessary, but yes." Lambda wore a green sundress that hugged her around the middle and was held up by thin straps over her shoulders, revealing part of the bodysuit she still wore underneath. The skirt went down to her knees, which were covered up by cotton tights. She also had a pair of black, open-toed shoes with a three-inch raised heel. She'd also purchased a green hair tie that matched her dress, with which Kairi had tied her hair up in a high ponytail. Lambda's blonde mane still dropped past her skirt, but it wasn't getting in the way of her arms anymore. "It's weird, but I think I'm actually having an easier time walking in these heels! Murakumo always held me up on tip-toes; maybe that has something to do with it?"

(Also, Lambda could still move her hair around at will, even though the sword that kept it in a braid had vanished. She was considering different things to tie on the end of her ponytail to make use of that trait, but hadn't decided on anything yet. Nu-13 had landed a scarily effective attack on Relius with her braid blade...)

Xion, on the other hand, had traded in her Black Coat for a simple outfit consisting of a black T-shirt and blue denim shorts, along with simple black sneakers and white gym socks. "I think this shirt will revolutionize the industry!" The shirt had a white bar across the chest that displayed a custom slogan in blocky, black letters: it read, _"I Helped Save the Worlds and All I Got Was This T-Shirt"_. The slogan could be magically changed every time she put the shirt on. She had also added a hairclip to her bangs in the shape of a Paopu fruit, and she wore a pair of silver chains in loops on each wrist. They were advertised as "Protect Chains" that conferred +1 Defense per item, although the shopkeeper had no clue what that meant.

 _"It's neat that magic items have been washing up on the shore ever since Sora's first adventure,"_ Namine mused aloud. _"Maybe this world won't be so isolated forever."_

"Hopefully any visitors can wait until after lunch," Kairi replied. "I hope the burgers aren't cold..."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Destiny Islands: Food Court..._

When the girls joined the rest of the party at one of several plastic tables in the middle of the market, it turned out that the burgers were the only part of the meal that had gone cold: a casualty of poorly-arranged heating lamps.

Kairi cleaned the ruined taste and texture out of her mouth by chugging a lemon-lime soda as fast as she could...followed by wiping her lips on a napkin with utmost etiquette and poise. She blinked innocently at the stares around her. "What?"

Luckily, the soft pretzels that were included as a side dish were still pretty warm. Lambda supposed no one would have heard of France on the Islands, so French fries wouldn't exist...but Lambda wouldn't have it any other way. "These pretzels are amazing - an S-class culinary feat! It's like Sea-Salt Ice Cream, but without any chance of brain freeze! Please pass another, Riku!"

Riku passed Lambda a third pretzel, then continued munching on his first one. "This is the last one you get."

Xion picked the lettuce off her burger and wrapped it around a pretzel, but grimaced as she bit into it. "...This tasted way better in my head."

Selphie slowly picked at just the lettuce. "What a let-down."

Sora, Tidus, and Wakka were engaged in an impromptu eating competition over the cold burgers; none of them were bothered by the poor quality in the slightest. Sora won with twice as many points as the others. "Yagm, th' scormph's 4-2-2!"

Namine chided him, _"Sora, don't talk with your mouth full."_

Selphie bounced in her chair and asked, "So, what were your adventures like? Were there giant monsters?"

"Dozens," Riku bragged. "I've fought dragons, giant robots, a zombie-coffin-flower-thing that ate other Heartless, a hundred-foot-tall octopus lady with more warts than tentacles, chameleons, more dragons, and a couple giant Heartless with tentacles all over their faces, just to name a few of the nastiest ones. Oh, and the big boss, Xemnas, had three _more_ dragons to sic on us."

"Don't forget the thousands and thousands of little Heartless monsters," Sora added after swallowing the last burger.

Selphie asked, "What about princesses? Did you get to rescue any princesses?"

Kairi replied, "Yep, _seven_ of them. I turned out to be the seventh Princess of Heart, actually."

Selphie gasped in excitement. "Ooh! Do you have a crown?"

Kairi raised an eyebrow at her. "No, of course not. I have a Keyblade now, but I don't have a crown. Or a kingdom...unless Ansem the Wise was my father. I sure hope not; he sacrificed himself near the end, so that would mean my dad is dead. That poor man...Xehanort and his other apprentices really ruined his life."

"Xehanort?"

Lambda picked up the story. "Xehanort was the biggest bad guy. About ten years ago, he invented a machine to make more Heartless, which ended up wrecking Radiant Garden, the world where he lived. Then he turned into a Heartless on purpose for some reason, and started calling himself Ansem to steal that name from his teacher. But he needed to get back a physical body, so he tried to possess Riku." 

"Whoa, what a creep..."

"As Xehanort would say, 'In- _deeeeed_ ,'" Riku continued. "He was also overly dramatic about everything, and it was always Darkness this, Darkness that, ' _SUPREEEME DARKNESS!_ 'the other thing. It was a real pain and took almost a whole year, but I've finally gotten the last bits of him out of my heart, thanks to the real Ansem's sacrifice. For a while there, I even had to body-snatch not-Ansem in reverse. Thank Light that that's over."

"But we were calling Xehanort's Heartless 'Ansem' for almost that whole time, and the real Ansem called himself 'DiZ' the first time we met him, so I still call them by those names," Lambda added. "Don't think about Ansem's history too hard; you'll just hurt your head."

"And what about you...Roxas, was it? What's your story?"

Roxas scratched his hair, trying to think of where to start. "Well, when Sora was trying to rescue Kairi the first time..."

"I hate how I got kidnapped _so_ many times..." Kairi interrupted.

"...Anyway, it turned out Kairi's heart had already ended up inside Sora."

"Like she was stalking him from within?" Selphie asked incredulously.

"Uh, maybe? I remember getting weird visions now and again, but I never felt stalked?" Sora tried to find a way to describe it without making Kairi sound like the bad guy, but he didn't quite manage it. After all, nothing quite like that had ever happened before or since.

"... _Anyway,_ Sora had to stab himself with the Keyblade to get Kairi's heart out of him and back into her body, and that's when both me and Namine were created."

"Who's Namine?" Selphie asked.

 _"I'm Namine,"_ the girl in question spoke up from inside Kairi's heart, startling Selphie's trio and several people at adjacent tables. _"Roxas and I are what's called 'Nobodies', which is a bit of a misnomer. We're all body, which is what's left after a person's heart is stolen by the Heartless...at least, not until we sort of...grew new hearts. I'm Kairi's Nobody, and Roxas is Sora's. We both fused with our original selves eventually, but Lambda helped Roxas and Xion separate from Sora. I chose to stay with Kairi."_

Selphie looked rightfully confused. "Xion, are you a Nobody, too?"

"No, I'm something even stranger. I'm a Replica of Roxas. I was created artificially by one of the other Nobodies in Organization XIII, which was a group of thirteen powerful Nobodies, as the name suggests. There was a big, complicated plan to have me pick up all Sora's memories after Namine scattered them..."

 _"Long, long_ _story,"_ Namine interjected.

"But that plan fell apart due to Namine's intervention, and I ended up dying and returning to Sora. Since I'm mostly made of memories, everyone forgot about me when I returned to Sora. Everyone except Lambda." 

Lambda picked up the story. "I think it's because Sora didn't know me at the time, and Namine's memory powers have to work through a connection with Sora. Anyway, I made it my personal mission to bring Xion back, and I finally managed it earlier today, with Namine's and Kairi's help. Getting Roxas back too was mostly a bonus, but a very important one; he has to constantly Observe Xion for them both to keep existing."

"...Did you just pronounce a capital letter in 'Observe'?" Selphie slowly asked.

"Nice catch! I come from another reality called the 'Azure Timeline', where Observation is serious business, because nothing can exist without some powerful being constantly Observing it. The Azure Timeline and your Heart Timeline were all tangled up for a while, but I think we're safe from any more Time Break portals of potentially multiverse-erasing doom for now."

Tidus briefly joined the conversation; he looked scared. "...I'm going to pretend I didn't hear any of that. But the point is we're safe now, right?"

"Right. I stopped the guy who was making Time Breaks, too, so no worries there. Eventually, I hope we can find a more stable way to cross over into the Azure Timeline, since the last visitors hinted that things have gotten a lot better over there, but for now, the two timelines will remain separate."

"Right," Sora concluded. "We've defeated Ansem: Xehanort's Heartless, and Xemnas: his Nobody. There's nothing left of Xehanort to trouble the worlds again. And even if he did come back somehow, we have a bunch of Keyblade wielders right here at this table, so we'll stop him!"

Right on cue, a glass bottle appeared in the middle of the table with a golden flash of Light. Inside the bottle was a rolled up sheet of paper; the only recognizable marking on the outside of the roll was a familiar stamp in the shape of King Mickey Mouse's head.

Riku leaned in. "Whoa, a letter from the King already? This might be a bad thing..."

Selphie thought the exposition was still going on, so she asked, "What King?"

"I had two great friends named Donald and Goofy who traveled with me on all my journeys. They were trying to find their king, Mickey Mouse."

"A mouse was their king?" Wakka asked skeptically.

Riku nodded. "Well, Donald is a duck and Goofy is a dog; you saw them, right? King Mickey also helped me a lot while I was trying to deal with the Darkness inside me. I consider Mickey a great friend of mine, as much as Donald and Goofy are to Sora."

"Who are you, and what have you done to Riku, you big softie?" Tidus tried to reach across the table to grab Riku, but somehow ended up pinned to the ground under Riku's new white-and-yellow sneakers.

"Sora, just read the letter already," Riku urged. "I think that's enough recap for today."

Sora popped the letter out of the bottle and unrolled it. Everyone crowded around behind him as he began to read it aloud...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: And thus begins a new adventure. Here we go again!_

 _As usual, expect very slow updates. It might be even SLOWER, since I'll have to make up the "Training Worlds" (inside Merlin's "temporally flexible space" ) from scratch._


	2. Sleep Over

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 2: Sleep Over**

 _ **-"I Never Finished Explaining..."-**_

 _A/N: Here we go with Chapter 2! Did you miss me?_

 _I'm not going to even bother going through the menus in OpenOffice to insert the Greek letter χ so many times. When you see the word "X-Blade" in this story, please just mentally replace the capital X with a [chi]._

 _But first, there's a bit more setup and exposition to get out of the way._

 _Rather than reproduce Mickey's letter verbatim, let's just summarize..._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Destiny Islands: Food Court..._

After Sora finished reading the letter from Mickey aloud, he took a deep breath and asked, "Did anyone else understand that?"

Riku mused, "He could be saying there's more to do, congratulating us on what we already did, inviting us to go meet someone, or...something."

Lambda summarized, "I think he's found new information about previous Keyblade wielders who are somehow important to Sora, and he wants Sora and Riku to go meet him in person to discuss it further. Maybe we can find out what happened to those other wielders."

Namine spoke up, _"He must have deciphered the clue I left in Jiminy's Journal!"_

"Oh, right, you did mention that once, before your brief stint in our party," Riku recalled.

"You mean about the other person in Sora's heart?" Lambda asked.

"What?! _Another_ one?" Kairi yelped. "Geez, Sora, how many hearts do you have?"

Sora awkwardly objected, "I dunno! I don't remember absorbing any hearts at all! I didn't realize I got yoursuntil WAY later, and I was definitely awake when it happened."

"Well, it looks like Mickey would currently be the best guy to ask," Riku decided. "Does it say how we should reach him? They kinda took the Gummi Ship with them."

Right on cue (again), another bottle materialized on the table. Sora whipped out the letter inside and unrolled it. "' _Whoops! I forgot to mention what you should do next! I'll swing by with the Gummi Ship at noon tomorrow. (Lambda, use that World Clock thing to know when! I'll try to match it to the time on Destiny Islands.) Yen Sid wants to meet Sora and Riku as soon as possible, but I convinced him that you've all earned at least a bit of a break!_

 _Yours, [mouse head symbol]_ '."

Sora finished reading. "Well, that settles that. I guess the next adventure's starting pretty soon!"

Selphie whined, "Aw, Sora and Riku are going away again? But they just got back!"

"More importantly," Xion added, "are Sora and Riku the only ones who will go?"

"No," replied Kairi.

Sora started, "But it'll be dangerous-"

Kairi interrupted, "No, Sora. I need to talk to Yen Sid, too. If he trained King Mickey, maybe he can train me, too! I want to get stronger, so I won't be left behind when you and Riku go on your adventures anymore!"

Xion added, "And I want to know where my Keyblade went, and if I can get it back. Riku got his back, but my case is a bit different..."

"In that case, all of us had better go," Lambda decided. "I really, _really_ want to learn how to wield the Keyblade without tripping over myself. If we have this power, we should learn how to use it properly. Plus, it can only be a good thing if one of the Princesses of Heart can defend herself, right, Sora?"

Sora relented. "Yeah, you've all got a point. At least Yen Sid wouldn't put Kairi in any real danger...I hope."

Riku sighed. "And just when we got back home, too...well, we have at least a day to rest before we go. Before that, though, I have something I need to take care of..."

"A haircut?" Kairi teased.

Riku blinked in surprise; that was exactly right. "How'd you guess?"

"It's kind of hard to miss, dear," Lambda answered while flipping Riku's bangs out of his eyes. "And it _has_ been about a year since your last haircut."

"Are you getting a haircut too, Lambda?" Xion asked. "I mean, my hair's already pretty short, but you have _so_ muchhair. Doesn't it get heavy?"

"I probably shouldn't cut it, actually. I can move it around, see?" Lambda swung her ponytail in a full circle behind her head without moving her neck, causing everyone to stare. "I bet I can get some use out of it if I keep it long."

Riku was the first to speak up. "...I don't know whether to be fascinated...or kinda creeped out."

Lambda blushed in sudden embarrassment. "Well, it's a part of me, so I don't want to just keep it a secret. But if you think I should cut it..."

Riku replied, "No, you're right that it could be useful. Anyway, I guess I'll look around to see where I can get a haircut. Kairi, can the newcomers stay at your place?"

Kairi responded, "Sure thing. I've never had a sleepover before, but I'm sure my dad will be okay with it."

"Will all three of us fit?" Lambda asked, indicating herself, Xion, and Roxas.

"Oh, I forgot to tell you that Kairi was adopted by the mayor when she washed up on the Islands. Her house is pretty big," Riku remarked as he walked off.

Xion nodded. "Right. Come to think of it, I have Sora's memories about that. He never saw the inside of your house, though."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Kairi's House..._

In the end, Kairi's dad agreed to let Lambda and Xion stay over, but adamantly refused to host any sleepovers if Kairi would sleep with boys, so Roxas had to make arrangements with Sora. (Kairi decided to postpone informing her father about her new relationship with Sora until _after_ the meeting with King Mickey.)

Kairi led the other girls up to her room, which had pink walls, a pink rug, a pink dresser, and a pink king-sized bed with pink covers and pink pillows. Kairi had managed to use nearly every imaginable shade of pink to decorate her room. The only non-pink items were a few stuffed animals sitting next to the pillows, such as a bat, a lion, and a dolphin.

After seeing Kairi's room, Lambda and Xion both had to stumble away and sleep on the couch in the living room, rather than endure all that _pink_ for a whole night. Kairi was not amused...until the next morning, when she woke up first, moved her alarm clock (which was also pink) right next to her guests' ears, and set off the alarm. "Rise and shine, you rude, lazy bums! Time to eat breakfast and get ready for our meeting with the King!"

"Ow..." Lambda rubbed her ears and fumbled around for her hair tie. As she tied her hair into a ponytail, she grumbled, "Is this about us sleeping out here instead of your room? I didn't think you could be such a vicious prankster..."

"Oh, no, this was Namine's idea." Kairi smiled over her shoulder as her way of acknowledging Namine's presence, although that presence came from within instead of from a particular direction.

 _"One of the perks of not having a physical body is that I'm relatively immune to any retribution when I act up. I think I'm getting more confidence in myself like this!"_

"Good for you," Xion mumbled before collapsing into a plate of toast (thankfully, she hadn't spread jelly on it yet), "but let me sleep for five more minutes..."

Xion had no time to catch up on sleep; the doorbell rang. Kairi opened the front door (the atrium was right next to the kitchen) to reveal Sora, Roxas, and Riku.

Lambda exclaimed, "Whoa, you look really different with short hair, Riku!" This detail actually managed to wake Xion up. Indeed, Riku had shaved off most of his hair, leaving him with just enough silver hair to graze the tops of his ears. It still managed to keep the layered look it had before, though. As for Sora and Roxas, they still looked exactly the same as they did yesterday, ultra-spiky hair and all.

Riku grinned. "I like to think of it as a new start for me. Anyway, since Mickey didn't say _where_ he'd be meeting us, I think we should all head out to the other island again so he can see us from the air."

Lambda checked her World Clock, which required summoning her Black Coat first. "All that effort to pick out a new outfit, and I don't even have any pockets...not that I had any before. Anyway, we have about an hour before he's supposed to show up, but knowing Mickey, I bet he's going at top speed, so he'll get here really early. Xion, can you hold onto the clock for me?" She passed the item to Xion, who stuffed it in one of the pockets on her shorts, then dismissed the Black Coat, leaving her in her new dress again. Everyone thanked Kairi's father (a kindly old man, although he ran a very strict household), then filed out of the house and down to the beach to take boats to the smaller island.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Destiny Islands: East Beach..._

As Lambda predicted, the thrumming sound of the Gummi Ship landing drowned out the local seagulls about twenty minutes before noon. A Magitek circle appeared beside the _Highwind_ , and King Mickey appeared in the circle. "Hey, fellas! I would say 'long time no see', but, y'know..."

Riku chuckled. "Yeah, we know. 'A hero's work is never done,' and all that. Even when there are so many heroes to help get the work done."

"Are all of ya comin' along?" Mickey asked Sora, Riku, Kairi, Xion, Roxas, and Lambda.

"Yes, Your Majesty. We all want to be trained to use the Keyblade," Kairi replied.

Mickey rubbed his nose. "Gosh, there's no need to be so formal! But I'm sure we can work something out when we meet with Yen Sid. You're all welcome to come along!"

Xion asked, "Okay, Mickey. What happened to the cool Gummi Ship you had last time?"

"Oh, the _Falcon Peak_? There weren't any Heartless or Nobodies in the Gummi Routes I took, so I decided we didn't need to come here in a heavily armed warship. Don't worry, we added more seats to the inside, so now it's kinda like a space bus."

"It was also a fruitless attempt to slow yourself down, right?" Lambda teased.

King Mickey bashfully rubbed his head. "I just can't help it. Anyway, all aboard!" He dashed (still at full speed) back into the teleporter, and all the heroes followed in single file.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Mysterious Tower: Study..._

The Gummi Ship ride back to Yen Sid's lopsided tower was uneventful. Like Mickey said, no enemy ships accosted the _Highwind_ on its journey. It was good to note that a set of Gummi Routes still connected Destiny Islands, Disney Castle, and the Mysterious Tower, but Lambda noted that all the other Gummi Routes had disappeared again. The last Gummi Route was the same space the Ghost Train traveled through to connect the Mysterious Tower to Twilight Town, which provided a calm and relaxing backdrop to the voyage.

Now the heroes were packed into Yen Sid's personal study. They could barely all fit in front of the old sorcerer's stately desk.

Yen Sid rose from his chair, and everyone else bowed respectfully...resulting in Sora and Riku bonking their heads against the desk. "My apologies to all of you. When I designed and conjured this tower, I never expected I would have to host this many guests at once. Mickey, I only requested Sora and Riku's presence today. Why did you bring so many of these children along?"

Kairi spoke up instead of the King. "Master Yen Sid, we are all chosen wielders of the Keyblade. None of us wanted to be left on the sidelines while there's a new threat to the worlds. But I need training before I'll be ready to follow Sora on his next adventure, and the same goes for Lambda, Xion, and Roxas. Can you help us?"

Yen Sid stroked his beard as he considered Kairi's request. "First of all, I am no longer a Keyblade Master myself. I once was, however, and I do possess knowledge of the ancient methods by which the Keyblade Masters of old trained their apprentices. Unfortunately, the task for which Sora and Riku were called here will demand my full attention, so I will not be able to personally oversee your training."

The four would-be apprentices' expressions fell, but Yen Sid continued talking at his own deliberate, unhurried pace. "Worry not. I was watching you board the Gummi Ship, and I predicted your request. I have already contacted an associate of mine, Merlin the Wizard, along with three good fairies from the same world as Maleficent. Merlin's plan is rather unorthodox, but if it succeeds, their combined magic will be able to compress months of training into mere hours. He and the fairies await your arrival beyond that door," Yen Sid's sweeping hand indicated the room on his left, where Sora had acquired his _very special_ outfit during his previous adventure, "But first, you should all be aware of the task for which I called Sora and Riku hither."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A lengthy explanation..._

Yen Sid proceeded to discuss, at great length, a long series of events that started in the age of fairy tales, and came to a head almost twelve years ago. The original Xehanort, who was one of the most powerful Keyblade Masters ever known, had tried to recreate a terrible event that was deliberately hidden from history: the Keyblade War, fought by wielders of those weapons in order to claim the X-Blade (pronounced "Key Blade", confusingly enough), which would in turn unlock the door to the one true Kingdom Hearts.

Back when all the worlds were one World, there was an abundance of Light in everyone's heart, and there was no Darkness to speak of. People believed this Light was a gift from a world called Kingdom Hearts, which was sealed away from the World by the X-Blade. People forged their own Keyblades in the image of the true X-Blade, then turned them on each other as weapons of conquest, hoping to claim the X-Blade, Kingdom Hearts, and ultimate power.

They fought for a whole spectrum of reasons, but in the middle of the fighting, Darkness was born in their hearts, and that Darkness swept the World away, shattering the X-Blade into twenty pieces. The real Kingdom Hearts was lost in the Realm of Darkness, but eventually, the last little fragments of Light came together to remake the World as Sora and friends knew it: a multitude of tiny worlds, kept divided from each other by thick walls of Light so the terrible Keyblade War could never be repeated.

"That story smells really fishy," Lambda interrupted with a furrowed brow. "Who had the X-Blade originally? If the whole World was lost in Darkness, who was left to rebuild it? And if Kingdom Hearts is the combination of all hearts, then who would be left to wield that power?"

Yen Sid sighed heavily. "As I said, even Keyblade Masters are forbidden to know the whole story. I only know what Xehanort said to the Keyblade wielders who opposed him when he tried to recreate the X-Blade himself."

Lambda rolled her eyes. "Good to know Xehanort is as dumb as those precursors; maybe we have a chance to beat him. Go on."

"Indeed. Xehanort was stopped in his machinations, but the Keyblade wielders who stopped him were brought to ruin by the effort, and in the process, he managed to transfer his heart to a younger vessel. Riku, you have experienced this technique firsthand; you know of its terrifying power and implications. By jumping from host to host, Xehanort intended to remain alive in the Realm of Light until he succeeded in gaining control of Kingdom Hearts. Even now, he likely seeks another vessel to inhabit."

Xion asked, "But he was eliminated, right? Sora beat both his Heartless and his Nobody. He should be dead."

Yen Sid shook his head. "If only it were that simple. Xehanort's heart, once seized by his Heartless half, has been released by the power of the Keyblade, and his body, which had taken the form of his Nobody, has been eliminated. Now that his two halves have been freed from the grasp of the Darkness, he will almost certainly become whole once more. And a man like Xehanort will have left many roads open to reach his goal. We cannot expect him to give up after all this time."

Sora scratched his head. "So, when you beat a person's Heartless and Nobody with the Keyblade, that person becomes whole again? That actually makes me feel a lot better. I haven't killed any of those members of Organization XIII; I just saved them. Hopefully, the same goes for the lesser Nobodies."

Yen Sid smiled and nodded at him. "Indeed it does, but only if their hearts had become part of Xemnas' Kingdom Hearts before he was defeated. On behalf of those thousands of innocent people who now live again, I thank you for your efforts, Sora and friends. However, Organization XIII was originally formed from Xehanort's willing collaborators; some of them may still give Xehanort their allegiance. If that is the case, then we must be ready to fight them again.

"Regardless, there is still the matter of the three Keyblade wielders who stopped Master Xehanort's original plan. Though they were able to stop Xehanort from laying claim to Kingdom Hearts, they were all lost in Darkness - a Darkness in which they still slumber. Through the test Sora and Riku shall take, we may acquire the power to awaken them. Which brings us to the task at hand.

"In your first adventure, Sora, you restored many worlds that had been lost to the Heartless. However, some of those worlds never returned completely. Instead, they fell into a deeper slumber, sealed off from even the Heartless' grasp, locked within the Realm of Sleep. Sora and Riku, your task is to enter these 'Sleeping Worlds' and find the seven 'Sleeping Keyholes' that correspond to the seven pure hearts. By unlocking these Keyholes with your Keyblades, you will gain the power to awaken any heart from even the deepest slumber. Do this and return here safely, and I will name you both...true Masters."

"Sounds easy enough," Sora replied. "Just you watch, we'll both pass this test with flying colors!"

"I'll make sure Sora doesn't get in over his head," Riku added, then laughed Sora glared at him.

Yen Sid held up a hand to silence them. "It is not so simple to enter the world of a dream. You will not be able to fly there on the Gummi Ship. Instead, I will send you back in space and time, to the very moment when the Destiny Islands were swallowed by the Darkness. There, you will be able to unlock the first Sleeping Keyhole and enter the Sleeping Worlds proper. From that point on, you need only follow the currents of the dreams as they drop you from one Sleeping World to the next, but be vigilant. The Sleeping Worlds contain their own form of Darkness, called Dream Eaters. They come in two varieties: the evil Nightmares, which consume happy dreams, and benevolent Spirits, which consume the Nightmares and can be powerful allies to you. As the Heartless once guided you to the World Gates, let the Dream Eaters guide you to the Sleeping Keyholes. Good luck, and may you return swiftly with a new power in hand."

Kairi spoke up, "Time travel? Isn't that really dangerous?"

Yen Sid made a calming gesture. "You need not worry for Sora and Riku's safety; I know a few forgotten secrets of my own. Among them is a limited method to travel through time without risking a paradox or other difficulties. There are restrictions to its use, but fortunately, all the prerequisites are already met: a version of Sora and Riku existed at the place and time to which they need to go, and the Sleeping Worlds are exempt from any destined events that would resist being changed. The only true danger in this test should come from the Nightmares."

Lambda sighed in relief. "That's good. They've proven they can handle a few dark monsters."

"Ah, but to truly master the Keyblade, they will need to forget their self-taught lessons, and start anew with a blank slate."

"What? Again?!" Before Sora or Riku could protest further, Yen Sid waved his hands around to call on a massive amount of mana, and the boys vanished from the present day.

Namine reassured Kairi, _"Don't worry; They can both handle starting over from the bottom in terms of power. Sora had to do that at least twice already, and Riku had to start from scratch in Castle Oblivion, too."_

"That's still going to be a huge pain in the neck," Lambda grumbled in sympathy. "But there's no point worrying about them right now; we have our own training to start. Thank you for all the info, Yen Sid. If it's okay, we should head over to meet Merlin and the fairies."

Yen Sid nodded. "You are dismissed, Lambda, Kairi, Xion, and Roxas. May you find the power you seek, and may the stars watch over us all."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Mysterious Tower: Changing Room..._

The four new Keyblade wielders bowed to Yen Sid one last time, then filed into the next room. Another wizard was waiting for them in the cozy chamber; his blue robes were simpler than Yen Sid's, but the wizard Merlin's unassuming garb belied his magical prowess, which far exceeded the other sorcerer's. With him were three kind old ladies in color-coded outfits with tiny but functional wings on their backs: the three good fairies who had given Sora his magic clothes.

"You're the ones who wanted to learn how to wield the Keyblade, correct?" Merlin said in a tone that implied that he already knew the answer. "Goodness, this batch is even younger than _those_ ones! Well, it's a good thing you have our experience to draw on!"

The red fairy introduced everyone. "Hello, dears. I am Flora. The green one is Fauna, and the blue is Merryweather. And this is the wizard Merlin. We're all old friends of King Mickey and Master Yen Sid. It's very nice to meet you as well."

"Okay, let's talk about how this is going to go," Merryweather spoke up. "The four of us will combine our magic to create a space pocket, which we'll fill with illusions. The inside the new space will be much, much bigger than the outside..."

"...And time will also pass much more slowly. You could spend ten months in there, and only a day would have passed outside. Time passes differently on different worlds, but this space we'll create is special," Fauna finished Merryweather's sentence.

Merlin finished the explanation. "I call the testing ground we'll create, 'the Training Worlds'. There will be seven worlds to complete in total. On each one, you must locate a certain powerful Heartless, defeat it, and unlock the 'Practice Keyhole' that appears afterward. In other words, this will be much like Sora and Riku's test, since they obviously gained great power from this process. However, I've taken the liberty of making sure the worlds you'll explore are brand-new to everyone; after all, it wouldn't be fair if some of you had prior experience! Everyone stand back, now, to the edges of the room. We wouldn't want any of you to be caught in the spatial expansion!"

Everyone moved away from the center of the room, with the trainees by the door and the magicians by the far window. The fairies and Merlin produced four wands, seemingly from nowhere, and twirled them in unison, then flicked the wands forward. Red, blue, green, and white beams of sparkly magic collided in the very center of the room, forming a brilliant globe of multicolored light that grew larger until it was large enough for any of the room's occupants to stand completely inside. A sort of filmy bubble developed around the ball of energy, slightly dimming its glow and stabilizing the rift. Merlin called, "It's ready! Have no fear; step into the bubble, and you will be transported to the Training Worlds!"

"Okay, let's go, then!" Roxas rolled his shoulders. This was the first time he'd spoken since they all arrived; he was getting restless.

"No, not you, Roxas!" Flora called.

"Aw, why not?" Roxas complained.

Fauna replied, "Your skill with your two Keyblades - and my goodness, what a unique talent! - is already more than equal to Sora's, so you don't need the same kind of training the others do. Instead, we'll train you with the power that was given to you by Lambda: the power of an Observer."

Merryweather added, "You'll be Observing Xion from here, and once you can handle it, you can try Observing the rest of them as well. This is a very, very important task; if you lose track of them, you and Xion will disappear!"

"Don't worry, my boy," Merlin reassured, "You're being taught by the best! I've already figured out exactly what this Observation is, and how it applies differently to our world than it did to the Azure Timeline. I'll teach you everything you need to know. As for you, Xion, you'll benefit from this as well. Here's a little spell to get you started... Ala-kazaa!"

Merlin flicked his wand upward twice, striking Xion and Roxas with faint, white streaks of magic. A similar streak briefly wound its way between the two recipients, connecting them by their eyes. They both gasped simultaneously as they felt an ethereal connection with each other being forged and strengthened. "And there you have it: the two of you now share a life-link! Now, the only way either of you could possibly die is if you both died at once. The life-link is permanent, but if either of you wants out, you can ask me after your training. You may experience some inconsequential side effects, too."

Lambda instantly bumped her opinion of Merlin upward by three brackets. Observation wasn't even possible in the Heart Timeline before Lambda showed up, and Merlin had already surpassed Lambda's grasp of the mechanics. He hadn't even watched Lambda Observing things directly! He only saw the results, in Xion and Roxas, for a few minutes - during this very conversation - and he could already initialize a life-link, when that process still eluded Lambda completely.

Roxas blinked as the magic line between Xion and himself faded from view; to the shock of the other trainees, his eyes had turned a much lighter, more vibrant shade of blue. Even more noticeably, Xion's eyes were now a vivid green, like Axel's had been. (Lambda guessed the difference was because Roxas was the primary Observer, which would normally make him closer to the Azure.) Merlin tutted, "Now, the rest of you, go on! Enter the Training Worlds, and work hard to gain the powers and skills you'll need! We'll send you instructions as you go - you'll know when you get them."

"Thank you, Merlin!" Kairi skipped into the bubble, which rippled around her to let her inside. She vanished from view completely.

"Thank you as well, fairies!" Lambda walked purposefully into the bubble.

"Good luck, Roxas! I'm counting on you!" With one last smile, Xion ran headlong after her new friends.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Training Worlds: Hub..._

The three (three and a half?) girls appeared in the middle of a large, round room with nondescript, gray walls. Evenly spaced along the wall were six sets of ornate, white double doors, each with a black square above the frame. One of the doors had a glowing sign in the square, which read:

 _Training World 1:_

 _Midnight Town_

Before the girls could enter the first Training World, though, a bright, golden spark of Light dropped from the blank ceiling in the very center of the room. It flashed once as it settled on the ground, transforming into a letter in a bottle just like the ones King Mickey used.

Kairi picked up the bottle and tapped the letter out, which was marked with two simplified Keyblades crossed over each other. "It must be from Roxas," Xion guessed.

Kairi opened the letter and read it aloud. "'Hey, girls: Good luck in there! I'll send you a note like this every time you beat a world, but Merlin says I can't send anything in the middle of the tests. But it's okay to tell you that this first test should be easy: just wander around town until a giant Heartless jumps you. There will be people wandering around town, but they're just illusions; don't be surprised if they don't have much to say. You can buy stuff from them with the Training Points (TP) you earn from beating Heartless, though!

"Running out of space here, but...' The letter cuts off at the bottom there," Kairi finished reading.

Xion giggled. "Roxas, you hopeless blockhead! Maybe he'll plan a better speech next time."

Namine noted, _"It's too bad we can't send anything back to them; how will we know if we've improved?"_

"Well, if we don't get beaten up by the Heartless, that's probably a good sign," Lambda replied. "After all, Sora became so strong because he was thrown headfirst into his quests without anyone to hold his hand."

"What about Donald and Goofy?" Xion asked.

"Well, he didn't have anyone _competent_ to hold his hand." Lambda remembered Sora, Donald, and Goofy's tendency to end up piled on top of each other.

Kairi ran over to the active door and yanked on the handle, spurring the group into action. "Well, what are we waiting for? Let's try to get as strong as Sora!" A bright Light burst out from the open door, pulling all the girls toward their first trial.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: Finally, all the exposition is out of the way! Any more will be in bite-sized chunks between worlds, via letters from Roxas. Sometimes, the POV will briefly cut over to the characters waiting in the Mysterious Tower at the end of a chapter._

 _By the way, when visualizing the new eye colors of Roxas and Xion, think of Mu-12 and Noel Vermillion, respectively._

 _And yes, both of the old wizards are massively underestimating the dangers they've sent their Keyblade wielders to face. Sora and Riku have only the canon problems to worry about (and they're the only ones who need to worry about those, since Xehanort couldn't have known about the Training Worlds group from his Book), but Lambda's party isn't off the hook completely when it comes to villains...though you may be surprised at what I've got planned!_

 _...Lied "The Unplanner". I'll probably be the most surprised of all by my own writing, but I do hope I can keep this idea of mine on track. As usual, it'll probably take a long time to get even that far._


	3. Sleep In

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 3: Sleep In**

 **-"Don't Bother With the Smaller Enemies..."-**

 _A/N: Chapter 3 is pretty late again. Blank page anxiety, my old friend, I've come to talk to you again..._

 _The Training Worlds each have a unique gimmick to keep the girls on their toes. Midnight Town's gimmick is a simple one: it's a really, really big world. So big, in fact, that clearing it will take multiple chapters._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Midnight Town: Shopping Square..._

The girls opened their eyes in the first Training World. Lambda summed it up: "When I saw the name of the world was 'Midnight Town', I expected more buildings."

The _Shopping Square_ was little more than a circle of tents huddled around a glowing safe zone. Beyond the glow of the green circle, there were only ruins as far as the eye could see, which wasn't very far. A full moon lit up the starry sky overhead, but the whole world was otherwise shrouded in perpetual night.

A few people in ragged clothes wandered around the tents. Kairi went up to a nice-looking brunette lady and asked, "Excuse me, we're new here. Can you point us toward a big Heartless?"

Xion facepalmed at Kairi's lack of tact, but the lady's response was even weirder. "Welcome to Midnight Town! Not much here at the moment, sorry."

Kairi insisted, "But there must at least be Heartless around. You know, the scary monsters with glowing yellow eyes?"

"Welcome to Midnight Town! Not much here at the moment, sorry."

"..." All three girls just stood there for a moment and stared as the nameless lady walked around in a circle. Once she wandered back to where Kairi was, she said again, "Welcome to Midnight Town! Not much here at the moment, sorry."

"...Well, thanks anyway!" Kairi hurried back to the rest of her party. "I guess we're on our own."

Namine pointed out, _"Roxas did write that the people here wouldn't have much to say..."_

"I'll scan for Heartless," Lambda volunteered. "...Whoa. This world is a lot bigger than the ones I've seen before! There are lots of groups of Heartless in basically every direction."

"Let's start by clearing each group. Eenie, meenie, miney...this way!" Xion pointed in a random direction and started walking.

"I can find this place again, so no worries about getting lost," Lambda added as everyone followed Xion out of the square.

"I hope we don't have to just clear out Heartless one by one until we find the group with the boss in it..." Kairi groaned.

"The 'boss'?" Lambda asked. "Heartless don't normally order each other around."

Kairi elaborated, "You know, like a video game. At the end of the level, there's always a big, strong enemy to beat, and then you move on to the next level."

"...You play video games?" Xion asked after a moment.

"It was the closest thing I could get to going on an adventure like Sora does, okay?" Kairi huffed.

"Well, if it prepared you for the sort of test we're going through now, then I say good for you," Lambda appeased.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Midnight Town: Ruined Alleyways..._

 _Defeat all of the Heartless!_

By now, the girls had left the Shopping Square far behind. Ruined buildings loomed on either side of the street they were following, but every door was blocked by rubble. Without a light source, it was hard to see much of their surroundings...but the eyes of a dozen Shadows stood out like streetlamps.

Kairi summoned **Destiny's Embrace** and ran in swinging, taking out three Shadows in the first lunge. "This is easy enough."

Xion tried to summon a Keyblade - any Keyblade - but it didn't appear, so she summoned her _Ouroboros_ jaw-sword instead. "This will have to do for now." The large, unwieldy weapon was slow to swing, but it had enough reach to keep four of the Heartless at bay with horizontal swings. She then brought it down vertically and pulled a lever on the hilt, causing the scary jaws at the tip of the weapon to bite at a fifth Shadow.

Lambda summoned **Elysium** and took a few swings of her own, but unlike Kairi, it took her more than one swing to finish off one Shadow. Frustrated, she gripped the Keyblade in both hands and swung with all her might at one of the last three Heartless, but it flattened itself against the ground and slipped behind her. Meanwhile, the momentum of the swing kept the Keyblade moving, and Lambda lost her balance. When she looked up from the ground, the pesky Shadow had resurfaced and was in the middle of pouncing...

Kairi cut the monster out of the air. "Be careful, Lambda!"

Xion finished off the last two Shadows, then offered Lambda a hand to stand up. "Are you okay?"

Lambda accepted the help, then dusted off her dress. "I'm fine, but that was so embarrassing."

 _"It looks like you need this training the most,"_ Namine spoke up.

"I thought I knew my way around swords, but I guess not," Lambda admitted. "I've never actually held a weapon in my hands before...but maybe it's not just that. In the weird Keyblade worthiness dream sequence I had back at the Altar of Naught, I took the staff and gave up the sword. The weird voice called it 'The Power of the Mystic. Inner strength. A staff of wonder and ruin'. What does it mean?"

Kairi considered this information for a moment, then replied, "...I have no clue what you're talking about."

Lambda asked, "Didn't either of you have a weird dream where you were standing on a pillar made of stained glass?"

That actually rang a bell for Xion. "Sora did! It was a day before the Destiny Islands were destroyed. Kairi called him a lazy bum when he woke up, but he was really freaked out."

"...How do you know all that?" Kairi asked suspiciously.

Xion hesitated; this was a complicated story, but she didn't see any way out of telling it. "You know how I was created as a Replica of Roxas?"

Kairi remembered Xion saying that at one point, but that didn't mean she understood anything about it. "I think my brain shorted out the last time you explained this."

 _"Maybe I can explain,"_ Namine interjected. _"I'll start with my part in it. I have power over memories. Sora's memories, specifically, and those of people connected to him. At one point, Organization XIII coerced me into taking Sora's memories apart. That's why everyone forgot him for a while, remember that?"_

"Oh yeah, I remember! I was the only one who even remembered there was another boy who left the Islands besides Riku."

 _"Sora had to go to sleep in a pod for a while while I fixed his memory. But while he was sleeping, Organization XIII had Xion going around with a fake Keyblade, and she started accidentally gathering up the lost memories, so Sora couldn't wake up."_

"It was...a bad time for all of us," Xion picked up the story.

"Understatement," Lambda interrupted.

"At least that mess has all been sorted out," Xion continued, "but I do still have Sora's memories all neatly organized in my head. Or copies of them, anyway. I remember everything that he knew up to the point where Roxas and I were separated from him again. So if you want to know what Sora was up to for the last year, just ask."

Kairi nodded. "Weird...but convenient! Okay, Xion. So, as you were saying about that dream?"

Namine was the one who answered, _"It can't be a coincidence. Not when Roxas ended up in the same dream while he was under attack by Nobodies. His version was a little different, though; he only had to pick a weapon, not give one up."_

"Xion, do you remember which weapons Sora picked?" Lambda asked curiously.

Xion replied, "He picked the shield, and gave up the sword. I remember he was really frustrated, trying to whack Heartless with a shield, but he stuck with his choice: 'The Power of the Guardian. Kindness to aid friends. A shield to repel all.'"

 _"I was watching Roxas in the dream, and he picked the sword: 'The Power of the Warrior. Invincible courage. A sword of terrible destruction.' Maybe that means Sora has all three now?"_

"But what do they all mean?" Lambda wondered.

"Well, the sword and staff seem pretty self-explanatory to me," Kairi pointed out. "Combat or magic; whichever one you picked should be easier, and the one you gave up should be harder. I can feel the Keyblade helping me swing it sometimes; maybe it's working against you instead because you gave up the sword."

 _"But, Kairi, you never had the dream, so which one did you get? All three?"_

Kairi shrugged. "I'd be fine with that. Riku just handed me a Keyblade he picked up from somewhere; whatever process was supposed to happen, I totally skipped it."

Lambda groaned. "So in summary, I'll always be at a disadvantage unless I learn how to use magic? That's no good. Magic in this universe is still a total mystery to me."

"And what's the Power of the Guardian?" Xion added.

"It probably boosts support and non-combat abilities, like Sora's Dodge Roll thing," Lambda guessed. "But further discussion will have to wait." She pointed out another group of Heartless that were trying to sneak up on them. Fortunately, the Shadows' eyes still glowed while they were flattened. "Let me try this again, and if I screw up, bail me out, okay?"

After getting nods from the other two, Lambda ran into battle. This time she made sure not to overextend herself with her swings, but she found that she was too slow to block when three Shadows pounced at once.

Xion blasted through the group with _Sonic Blade_ (a speedy air-to-ground lunge attack using her sword and wings of the same name) ending the battle before it could get out of hand. "Even without the Keyblade, I can hold my own just fine!"

Lambda held her side where a Shadow had managed to nick her. Even if they were illusions, these monsters certainly hurt like the real deal...but oddly, the Heartless' claws didn't damage her clothes or break her skin. "Thanks, Xion. I'm sorry if I end up holding us all back."

"No need to apologize. Actually, if I have to bail you out of deep enough trouble, maybe my Keyblade will appear!" Xion joked.

Lambda rolled her eyes. "I hope it doesn't come to that, but I've got to figure out magic before I can really fight. Namine, do you know anything that could help?"

 _"Well, there's my Panel Grid, but you shouldn't need to rely on that. Sora certainly learned how to use magic, but he's not here to share what he learned. Come to think of it, this would be a perfect job for Merlin. How is Merlin supposed to train us in_ anything _if he's not here?"_

Kairi asked, "Namine, you have power over the memories of people connected to Sora, right? What can you do with those powers?"

Namine explained, _"Why are you asking now? Anyway, I can read people's memories, disassociate some memories from others so they're forgotten, create fake memories, and even transform objects that hold significance to Sora, like erasing Jiminy's Journal or turning your promise charm into a different shape, since those are like physical memories. And I can do all of this without the victim ever realizing I tampered with their heart. What I_ can't _do is actually destroy a person's real memories; any little reminder would eventually undo any changes I made. By the way, all of us are connected to Sora. If Lambda wasn't at first, she certainly is now that she pulled Xion and Roxas out of him. But I'm not going to meddle with your memories ever again."_

Kairi yelled, "You messed with my promise charm?! ...No, I know you spent all year atoning for that. I certainly don't have a reason to get jealous of you as you are now." Kairi breathed out and calmed down. "Anyway, can you copy memories from one person to another? If you can do that, you can give Lambda a starting point to learn magic."

 _"That's...I actually can! Here it goes, Lambda; I'll try to draw your attention to the new memories, so just try to relax. Do I have your permission? I_ did _just promise not to meddle with your memories, but..."_

Lambda smiled and nodded. "Go ahead."

Unexpectedly, Namine's transparent image manifested next to Kairi, sitting cross-legged on the ground and hunched over her sketchbook. She didn't seem to notice that she'd manifested, engrossed as she was in her task.

As Namine sketched twin crayon drawings of Sora and Lambda shooting a Fire spell on facing pages of the book, Lambda felt an intense sensation of pressure on her skull. "Ow, that hurts! No, I have to relax...and remember..." The pressure suddenly disappeared, leaving Lambda with a burst of inspiration. "I get it! It worked! Thanks, Namine!" Lambda tried to hug Namine, but ended up falling through her. "...Oops."

"Tee hee! You're welcome. And thank you, Kairi, for finding a use for my power that doesn't make me feel like a monster. I feel like a whole new person!"Namine's projection vanished with a smile.

"I think I understand how to cast Fire now, so now I've got to practice. Let's scan for some Heartless...found one!" Lambda pointed her Keyblade at a small pile of rubble and called, "Fire!" A ball of flames shot from the tip of Elysium and homed in on the pile...or rather, on the Soldier Heartless hiding behind it. The fireball burst into a small explosion that scattered the rubble and revealed the monster, which jumped up as though startled, then started running at the girls with a weird gait between prancing and waddling. "Fire!" Another fireball zeroed in on the Soldier; this time, Lambda scored a direct hit and destroyed the monster.

Kairi clasped Lambda's shoulder. "Nice job, Lambda! Keep it up and see if you can learn other spells."

Lambda grinned and saluted. "Will do! This has been a productive day, but I'm still raring to go! And there are...there are a _lot_ of Heartless left to practice on." Her enthusiasm deflated a bit upon scanning the area and finding so many enemies, but she put on a determined smile. "We can take them all!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Two hours later..._

"Can we take a break?" Kairi moaned, her Keyblade drooping in her grip.

"It feels like we've been at this all day..." Xion fished the World Clock out of her pocket and glanced at it. "It's only been two hours?!"

Lambda's shoulders slumped as she finished blasting the last Soldier of the current enemy set. "Maybe we should rest for a bit. We have no shortage of time, after all." Casting magic drained her mana, which was like tapping a reserve of energy that Lambda hadn't even noticed having before, but it also tired her out physically. She could only shoot about ten Fire spells in a row before needing to rest for almost a whole minute to recharge her mana.

Another gaggle of Soldiers pranced around a corner up ahead; Kairi stepped forward to deal with them, but Xion jumped over her head, dual-wielding huge scimitars. "I'll stand first watch; I've got to test out this Ars Arcanum manifestation, after all. I should come up with a name for it, too."

"How about 'ScimitArs?'" Lambda joked.

"That's so corny it hurts," Kairi complained as she unclipped her purse from one of her dress' straps and laid down with the bag as a pillow. "I'm gonna take a nap, 'kay?" she slurred as she fell asleep right away.

"...I like that name," Xion decided. She continued chopping up Heartless with both hands while Lambda laid down on the bare ground and entered sleep mode.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Three hours later..._

"Kairi...Kairi, wake up!"

Kairi rolled over and mumbled, "...Pass the Sora sauce..." She was then jolted to wakefulness by a rap on the head.

Xion slowly came into focus, rolling her eyes. "What the heck were youdreaming about? Never mind; it's your turn to take watch, you lazy bum."

Kairi suddenly remembered everything with a yelp. "Oh, right! We were training with the Keyblade!" This whole ordeal was still a dream come true for her; she had been worried that she would wake up in her own bed on the Islands with Sora still missing.

Xion winced from Kairi's volume, but shrugged and dismissed her ScimitArs. "I'd say to keep it down because Lambda's still sleeping, but you both slept through five waves of Heartless, so I don't think you'll disturb her. I just didn't have the heart to wake you up, but now _I'm_ the one who's dead tired." She summoned her Black Coat into her hands, already nicely folded, and laid it on the ground as a pillow. "Wake me when it's time to go." Xion turned over a few times, but finally fell asleep.

Right then, a mixed group of Shadows and Soldiers appeared. Kairi muttered, "Are there only two kinds of Heartless on this world?"

She made quick work of the Heartless, feeling reinvigorated after her nap, but then she was left with nothing to do. "Namine? Are you awake?"

 _"Zzz...No, stop that, you'll ruin my organization scheme..."_ The sound of snoring coming from her own heart was kind of unnerving for Kairi, but she wondered what Namine was dreaming about. The words "organization scheme" had her a bit worried, too... She concentrated on Namine, and suddenly found herself in her own heart!

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Station of Awakening..._

"So this is what they meant about the dream..." Kairi's shoes touched down on a stained glass surface surrounded by puffy white clouds, through which rays of warm Light occasionally peeked from random directions. The picture was of Kairi herself as she looked right now, in her current outfit, holding Destiny's Embrace. Unlike other Stations, Kairi's eyes were open in the picture, gazing down softly at a trio of circular frames with Sora, Riku, and herself inside, appearing as they had before all these adventures started. The bottom half of the background was a walled city covered in fountains and flowers that Kairi didn't recognize, surrounded by a sparkling, tropical ocean that she knew very well; the top half of the background was solid pink.

Namine was lying asleep right in the middle of the pillar; above her head was a blurry bubble showing her dream. Peering into it, Kairi was relieved to see Namine chewing out Riku for setting her crayons out of order on a white shelf, not anything related to Organization XIII. Riku was even in his new clothes instead of a Black Coat, suggesting that this wasn't a memory at all, but merely a flight of fancy. Kairi giggled to herself, then looked around for a way out of the Station. "As much as I'd like to explore my own heart for a while, I have to keep watch so everyone stays safe. How do I get back out...?" In response to her wish, a spotlight shone down from the clouds overhead, illuminating a swirling circle of green Light like the one back in the Shopping Square. Kairi stood in it and felt herself vanish into sparkles, returning to awareness in her real body.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Back in Midnight Town..._

Kairi woke up just in time to block a Soldier's claw. "Whoa, that was lucky!" She got down to business trying to refine her swordplay, which still felt rough around the edges. Sure, she could hold her own against these things, which were the most basic kinds of Heartless, but she knew there were stronger types out there.

After dealing with the nuisances, Kairi sat down and twiddled her thumbs for about half an hour before another group came running at her. "Maybe I should try magic? Ignite!" She realized she had probably said the wrong word just after saying it, but she surprised herself with the effect.

Instead of her Keyblade shooting a fireball from its tip, the Shadow she pointed at spontaneously burst into flames that ate away at it over time. By the time the rest of the group reached her, the burning Shadow had popped from the continual damage. Kairi dealt with the other enemies with normal attacks.

Twenty minutes passed by before another group appeared; Kairi passed the time by thinking of new physical moves to try, and she was eager to test them. However, most of the moves she came up with turned out to take too long with unnecessary spinning and flourishes to safely use in combat; she found herself having to stumble out of the motions and defend herself from interruptions, so she discarded most of those ideas. Spinning her whole body around with the Keyblade held out and hitting enemies all around her seemed to work, though, which helped at one point when she was surrounded by Shadows. "Is it just me, or are the waves of enemies coming faster?"

Ten minutes later, a wave of Soldiers appeared in puffs of Darkness right next to Kairi, apparently replacing some of the ones that had been beaten earlier. "Um, Spark?" Kairi held up her Keyblade and tried to cast Thunder, but what happened was that an eight-sided crystal of solid Light appeared and spun around her while leaving a trail of rainbows, bashing the Soldiers away. "Not what I had in mind, but I'll take it!" The new spell had taken a lot of mana out of her, however, so she opted not to try and cast/invent any more spells for now.

"Maybe I should wake up the others." Kairi turned around, only to find that Lambda was already awake.

"I got a proximity alert; did the Heartless get too close?"

Kairi nodded. "A bunch of them popped out of nowhere! I think they're respawning as we beat them, which means our plan to take the groups out one by one isn't going to work. Plus, it looks like the other groups found us because we stayed in one place too long."

"Yeah, now that I think about it, taking a four-hour break is ridiculous. I'll wake up Xion so we can get moving, then. Hey, Xion?" Lambda nudged Xion with her foot, causing the raven-haired Replica to suddenly wake up...and immediately go on the offensive, swinging her fists around wildly. Luckily, she didn't summon a weapon, but Lambda got smacked by one of the Protect Chains on her wrists.

Thankfully, Xion soon calmed down and realized what had happened. "Oh Light, I'm so sorry! I got in the habit of attacking whatever woke me up while I was stuck without a Keyblade in the tunnels of Twilight Town. I had to wander around there for several days before Namine found me. I know it doesn't sound like a long time, but it was a pretty large part of my life if you consider that I'd existed for less than two months before that."

"Wow...just wow. Now I feel worse for you than for my cheek," Lambda replied, "but remember: you aren't alone anymore. We'll keep you safe."

Those words... "I'm not alone..." Xion held a hand over her chest, trying to name this overflowing emotion. "This feeling is...gratitude. Thank you, Lambda."

Lambda pointed at Kairi. "Don't thank me, thank her; she was the one on watch, keeping us safe. I'll take first watch next time."

Xion nodded seriously. "That's true, but still - I wouldn't be here in the first place if all three of you hadn't helped me, along with Sora and Roxas. I can't thank you enough."

A group of Shadows rose out of the ground, surprising the party. Xion summoned her ScimitArs again. "Geez, ruin the mood, why don't you? Ars Arcanum!" Her blades glowed yellow, and she leaped into the air, spinning wildly at the Shadows and blending the monsters into swiftly-evaporating paste.

"Hey, watch it!" Lambda yelped as she ducked under the glowing scimitars.

Xion dismissed the ScimitArs and bowed apologetically. "Sorry! I guess I should use a different weapon when we're all in a group, huh?"

Lambda nodded. "Good plan. Anyway, didn't you have four scimitars when you first used them?"

"Yes, but I also had four arms to hold them."

Kairi stared incredulously at the Replica. "...What."

Xion suddenly realized that _everything_ she had done back then was totally weird. "...Let's just pretend that fight never happened, please? I don't think I can turn into that form again, anyway."

Lambda suggested, "Maybe you can make the other two swords float behind you? All the other Organization members could levitate their weapons somehow."

"Maybe..." Xion stepped away from the other girls and re-summoned the ScimitArs, this time with the full set of four blades. Two of them floated over her shoulders, and by pretending to swing imaginary arms, she could send them sweeping around her.

Kairi nodded appreciatively. "Whoa, cool!"

"I had one other form, too, but it was really different from the others. I wonder if I can..." Xion stepped further away, faced away from the party, and summoned a truly massive sword with a Keyblade-like round handguard.

Its blade was silver and its handle was gold, both with a red hue near the bottom. At the tip of the blade, it split sideways into three red spikes, like a cross. However, it clearly wasn't a real Keyblade. It didn't have a Keychain...and it was more than twenty feet long! Its handle was as wide and tall as Xion herself. She almost immediately fell over forward, dropping the impossibly heavy weapon with a thundering crash.

The sword vanished into the same yellow flakes as the other weapons, and Xion sat up, rubbing her sore arms as sparkles drifted past her face. "So, that...um, happened. I guess I'll call that one 'Final Weapon', since if I can ever hold that thing, I'll probably be the strongest girl in the World. I was in a giant monster form when I wielded two of those back then."

"Are your arms okay?" Kairi asked.

Xion replied, "I'll be fine in a minute; I can walk. Can you and Lambda handle the next fight, though?"

Kairi smiled reassuringly. "Sure thing; take it easy for a bit. My arms are getting sore just thinking about how heavy that sword must be. I'm surprised you held it up as long as you did."

"Okay, now that that's all sorted out, let's move on." Lambda pointed slightly to the left of where the party was facing. "There are ruins of bigger buildings over that way; maybe we'll find the boss there?"

Kairi nodded. "It's as good a plan as any." The girls set off.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: To be continued in Chapter 4, where we'll meet the first boss!_

 _Sorry this took so long to get written. The stupid part is, when I actually get down to_ writing _, I can get the whole chapter done really fast. There's just a long, LONG stretch of time I always spend planning out what'll happen while staring at a blank page._

 _Our heroines are all quite unique, even for Keyblade wielders. I still have a few more tricks and benefits planned for each of them...which means their enemies won't be this weak much longer, either._

 _I don't have any idea what the "Sora sauce" Kairi mentioned tastes like. Other phrases I considered included "Five more minutes..." (too overused), "No, I couldn't eat another bite..." (also too overused in anime and such, even though no one I know would actually say that), and "I can't go to school today, Dad, I've got hibernation sickness..." (too verbose for a half-asleep character)._


	4. Five More Minutes

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 4: Five More Minutes**

 **-"...Go Straight for the Boss and Defeat It!"-**

 _A/N: Here we go again, with the remainder of Midnight Town and a bit of what comes next._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Midnight Town: Office District..._

It turned out that the large buildings Lambda had pointed out were a lot larger than she'd thought. As they kept walking, the diagonally-leaning chunks of a giant tower loomed larger...and larger...and larger. The wide road they walked along seemed to just keep going without ever actually reaching the tower. And all the while, Heartless attacks came more and more frequently.

Lambda spent the time training her stamina for magic use. She had a complete outline of how to cast Fire, but if she focused on the little details, then surely she could change how the spell worked. She went over the process in her head.

 _First, draw mana from your reserves. Then, focus on the image of a fireball and push the mana to your Keyblade. Yelling "Fire!" helps the visualization work. Finally, aim at something you don't like and release the energy once the spell is ready. Simple enough; what if I visualize something else?_

"Blizzard! ...Yes, it worked!" Instead of a fireball, Lambda successfully fired a chunk of solid ice that flew forward as though being carried down a tube. The three Shadows she had lined up for this test were all hit and destroyed by the spell.

Kairi cheered, "Great work, Lambda! ...Oh, and you should probably take a look at this trick I discovered while I was on watch. Ignite!" She pointed Destiny's Embrace at a Soldier and lit the hapless Heartless on fire, then let it burn up while she focused on melee combat against two other Soldiers.

Lambda stared blankly at the burning Heartless. "...Wait, so you just shouted the wrong word, and it turned out to be a different spell?" _Seriously?_ "So much for my carefully-crafted plan to learn more spells."

Xion held her Sonic Blade aloft and shouted, "Thunder!" Nothing happened. "...Nope, no spells for me, I guess. Not with this weapon, anyway." She switched to Ouroboros and tried again, this time bringing down a line of lightning bolts that passed over a Soldier and covered it in an electric charge. Another Soldier bumbled into the first victim, causing the electricity to discharge and shock them both into oblivion. "Okay, so Ouroboros works for magic. Funny; that was the same effect from the Panels I used to use, but I didn't use them this time."

Lambda copied her movements with Elysium. "Drift!" A black wave of energy spread out around Lambda, catching a Shadow that was sneaking up behind her. The unfortunate monster was bumped into the air, where it hung in place inside a glowing purple force field. Lambda swung her Keyblade at it, sending the Heartless spinning rapidly through the air until constant damage from the force field destroyed it. "New plan: shout random words and learn as many spells as I can."

Kairi groaned, "Good thing there seems to be no end to these Heartless, then." She cut down a few more Shadows with melee attacks, and finally no more spawned to replace them. "Um, or not."

Lambda looked down the road. "I'll scan for more...good, we have some breathing room. I vote we take a few minutes to rest. That tower is still another kilometer away, and the next patch of Heartless has different types in it."

Kairi tossed her Keyblade into the air and flopped to the ground, letting Destiny's Embrace dissolve into golden Light and flower petals as it hit the ground behind her. "Finally! I was about to give up on finding anything but Shadows and Soldiers!"

"Merlin never was the most creative guy when it comes to things that aren't magic," Lambda noted. "His naming sense is terrible, too. 'Bag of Holding', 'Pocket of Holding', 'Folder of Holding'... Riku and I had some dealings with him on our adventures. He's the one who gave Riku the blindfold to help him deal with the Darkness. He doesn't need it anymore, thankfully."

Xion grumbled, "He was tough enough to fight with it on! He beat my fake Keyblade barehanded and made it look easy."

"He's always made a point to be the strongest and coolest boy on the Islands," Kairi reminisced. "When Sora got the Keyblade, it must have made him jealous enough that the Darkness snuck in."

"Do you have any funny stories about Riku from when you all lived on the Islands?" Lambda asked. "I've traveled with him pretty much constantly since...Xion, do you still have that World Clock?"

Xion passed it to her, then remembered that she hadn't changed her shirt's slogan today. She concentrated, and changed it to say "No. _i_ of the Tiger".

Lambda finished her sentence, "...Whoa, it's been _exactly_ a year since I ended up in the Heart Timeline! Happy birthday and anniversary to me, I guess! And that means Xion's birthday would be...next week!"

"Um, maybe? I know I wasn't aware of pretty much anything before I met Roxas, but I could have spent a long time in Vexen's lab."

Lambda suggested, "Wouldn't the first day you became self-aware be a better birthday? That's when you started being _you_."

Kairi agreed. "That makes sense. But as for your first question, Lambda, I'm pretty sure Riku didn't get up to anything nearly as exciting on the Islands as the things you've done together. We played pretend a few times, and he made a point to utterly school all the other kids in play-fights every day for fifteen years straight. He always seemed restless, though. It was his idea to build a raft to leave the Islands."

Lambda tried to think of a question Kairi could answer. "Then, um... Oh man, I can't believe I never asked him about this, but what's his last name?"

Xion and Kairi raised their left eyebrows in perfect sync. "Last...name?"

Lambda was equally baffled. "Wait, you don't know what a last name is?"

Namine stepped into the conversation to clear up the confusion. _"The Islands are a REALLY small world. Everyone knows everyone else, and everyone has a unique name, so there's no need to have a second name to identify which family you came from."_

Lambda nodded in understanding. "Okay. That makes sense. It would've been so embarrassing to have dated him for a year without knowing his full name." _Proximity alert._ "Huh? The next wave of Heartless is almost here! C'mon, girls, this should be the last push before we get to that tower! Hopefully the boss is there; I can't tell if the massive Heartless reading I'm getting is from the boss, or just a whole bunch of flunkies."

She got back onto her high heels and summoned Elysium, launching a preemptive Fire spell at a little, floating, blue Heartless that popped in one hit. "It looks like this wave includes _Blue Rhapsodies, Red Nocturnes_ , and _Yellow Operas_. I've fought them before. They all use different, color-coded magic elements, but they take forever to cast a spell. They absorb their own element to heal, but they're weak to the other two. You can probably just swat them out of the air to beat them, but they don't hold still for very long."

"So if we just wipe them all out before they cast a spell, then that's it, right?" Xion summoned Ouroboros and began floating in midair, holding the jaw-sword out in front of her with its jaws opened as wide as they would go. She began charging a ball of orange energy in the space between the teeth, just in time for a group of fifteen assorted spellcasting Heartless to hover into view from the side paths of a crossroads. "Ragnarok!"

Unfortunately, the swarm of orange trails Xion's attack released weren't evenly distributed; a mixed cluster of two Red Nocturnes, three Blue Rhapsodies, and a single Yellow Nocturne managed to avoid being targeted by any of the homing shots. "Kairi! Mop up the stragglers!"

Kairi watched the Heartless' erratic flight paths, then made up her mind. "Bind!" A yellow circle of energy, similar to Thunder but more wavy, appeared on the ground under the Heartless. Every Heartless in the ring was temporarily locked in place, throwing off tiny sparks at random. "Yes! I _thought_ there would be a spell like that, since it's called a Keyblade, after all." She waded into the Bind effect, noting that it didn't have any effect on her, but it seemed to still be able to catch other enemies that could wander into it. As she started batting the immobilized Heartless out of the air, Namine called, _"Lambda, can you step into the circle? I want to test something."_

Lambda did as asked, stepping into the magic field with a bit of apprehension. "...I don't feel anything."

 _"That's a relief, then; I was worried that you might be able to hit each other with wide spells like this. I wanted to test it with something harmless."_

"Good thinking, Namine. Now let me try something...Drift!" Lambda's _Zero-Gravity_ spell took hold of the Heartless, regardless of element, and overrode the effects of Kairi's Bind spell. "Huh, so those spells don't work at the same time. Well, that's enough testing for now." Lambda jumped up and smacked both Red Nocturnes out of the air, then managed to stick the landing. "And I'm finally getting the hang of swinging this thing!"

Xion dove down on the last Heartless with her ScimitArs. "Isn't learning fun?"

"You know it!" Kairi jumped up and stabbed upward with Destiny's Embrace, then dismissed the Keyblade before she landed.

"...Was that some kind of victory pose?" Lambda asked.

Kairi grinned. "You should try to come up with one; it's fun!"

Lambda considered it...and came up with a few different poses to choose from. "Maybe I'll try one next time; we've still got some ground to cover."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Arena Pillar Ruins..._

Lambda repeated the name she heard to the others. "...So this was some kind of arena once?"

"You can hear that voice too, Lambda?" Kairi asked.

Xion looked around and asked, "What voice? I don't hear any voice."

Lambda explained, "It speaks up sometimes and gives me the names of places and enemies. It also told me that my 'Drift' spell was called _Zero-Gravity,_ actually. I thought I was the only one who could hear it...but I don't think I'm going crazy. Relius said something about a power similar to the Azure... Oh, I'm sorry for rambling. I doubt I'll get to the bottom of this today."

"Whatever it is, it's pretty convenient," Kairi pointed out. "It told me that those lesser Nobodies were called _Dusks_ when Axel showed up to kidnap me. Not that the info helped me get away at all, but it's nice to know."

 _"I've never heard a voice like that before, not even after we fused together,"_ Namine added. _"It must be tied to Kairi's heart somehow."_

"Uh-oh, we'd better leave the speculation for later!" Lambda summoned her Keyblade. "The boss is here!"

From every upturned chunk of the Arena Pillar (each chunk as big as a house in its own right), large Heartless began to pour out. Each _Commander_ looked like a Soldier, but they were three times larger overall, and were colored black instead of blue. Instead of heading for the girls, though, the Commanders clumped together a few yards ahead of them, crowding into a space that should have been too small for them all to fit.

Soon, the girls realized that the Heartless were actually climbing on each other's shoulders, stacking up into a single, larger collective. In no time at all, the whole army had formed into a single, bipedal monstrosity that towered over the fledgling Keyblade wielders. Two tiny, green _Deserters_ scrambled up the giant's body and positioned themselves on its head like eyes, completing the formation.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Defeat the Demon Army!_

Lambda relayed what she could gather from her scan. "It's called the _Demon Army,_ and it's an A-class threat. The _Commanders_ that make up its body don't take damage individually, but I think we can break apart its limbs if we focus enough attacks in one place! On the other hand, there's definitely a more concentrated patch of Darkness on its torso somewhere. If we can find that weak spot, we might be able to take it down!"

One of the Demon Army's massively-multiplayer "arms" started coming down toward the girls, who all dove out of the way. Luckily, the giant took a long time to regain its balance after the attack, and it moved way too slow to hit a moving target. Rather than let it try again, Lambda jumped onto the back of its fist. "Kairi! See if you can use Bind on the next limb it brings down!"

"I'm on it!" Kairi waved her arms to get the boss' attention, then lunged in and laid a Bind field where its foot was about to stomp after her. She did manage to stick the giant's leg in place, but the shockwave from the stomp knocked her down. Even worse, the giant had lost its balance, and it was about to fall forward and crush her!

"I've got you!" Xion, with her Sonic Blade equipped, zoomed past the impact zone and pulled Kairi out of harm's way. Rather than set her on the ground, Xion pulled them both higher into the air to get a better view of the monster. She called down, "Hey, Lambda, what's that glowing orb?"

"Probably what's holding this crowd together, but I'm kind of busy right now!" Lambda had been on top of the Demon Army's shoulder when it fell, but before she could strike anywhere, the giant lost some of its cohesion in the impact, and she sank into the mass of Soldier-type Heartless. Lambda was immediately buried over her head in monsters. She was able to swing her arms around, but she couldn't do enough damage to break through the Commanders around her.

 _I need some kind of power boost, NOW!_ Lambda frantically tried to think of a way out. Release Restriction 13 and use the Power of Darkness? No, the Darkness was the opposite of powerful for her right now. Come up with some new trick with the Keyblade? No time for that. Even a new spell probably wouldn't be strong enough.

Wait, there was one more thing to try - the last weapon she had left from the Azure Timeline! She remembered saying back when she lost Murakumo: " _IDEA Engine on standby, pending weapon link; unable to utilize in current format..."_ But now she had a weapon to link!

She called aloud, "IDEA Engine, activate! Link target: the Keyblade! Come on, work..." The Heartless had begun to notice the tasty heart trapped among them. Dozens of glowing yellow eyes blinked open, far too close to Lambda's own red ones.

Suddenly, a glowing field of green particles surrounded Elysium, making it visible even within the crushing Darkness around it. "Here goes nothing!" Lambda swung the Keyblade again, and this time she made headway. She hacked and crawled her way out of the Demon Army's arm, jumping free as soon as she saw the light of the moon overhead.

Overhead, Xion sighed in relief as she saw Lambda emerge from the mass of Heartless. "That was too close...! Hang on, Kairi, we're about to drop!" Xion switched from Sonic Blade to ScimitArs and immediately began to fall headfirst toward the orb on the Demon Army's back; luckily, the confusion caused by Lambda's escape had kept the Heartless too disorganized to make the giant stand up again. The Replica positioned all four blades below herself and began to spin as she fell, screaming, "I WISH I HAD A NAME FOR THIIIIIS!"

The impact let Xion drill almost halfway into the gooey blob of Darkness. Thinking quickly, Kairi disentangled herself from Xion's arms and drove her own Keyblade deeper into the core. "Haaah!" Something gave way under Destiny's Embrace, and the Darkness started bubbling and undulating. Namine warned them, _"It'll explode! Get out of there!"_

Xion flew them both out of the crater they'd made, just in time for the core to erupt in a purple-tinged explosion. The blast spread over the rest of the Demon Army, annihilating all the Heartless.

Lambda tried out a pose: she spun the Keyblade around her hand, stabbed it into the ground in front of her, and leaned forward over it. The particle effects from the IDEA Engine faded away as she did. "Yeah! Great work, everyone!"

Xion grinned and rested her Sonic Blade over her shoulder, allowing the sword and the wings to vanish as she did. Meanwhile, Kairi did the same victory pose from before.

Namine reminded them all, _"The Practice Keyhole should be around here somewhere, right?"_

"I see it!" Lambda pointed at a chunk of the Arena Pillar that had the word WELCOME carved into it. In the curve of the C, a glowing outline of a Keyhole appeared. "Kairi, would you do the honors?"

"Sure!" Kairi summoned Destiny's Embrace again and pointed it at the Practice Keyhole. Gold stars and blue-white Light gathered at the tip of the Keyblade, and then a beam of Light fired from there right into the Keyhole. "It worked! Now let's find a save point and get back to the hub room."

Xion asked, "'Save point?'"

Kairi sheepishly explained, "...It's another video game thing. I meant those green circles of Light, like the one back in the shopping square. We can probably get back to the hub from those. I don't think we could actually use them to come back if we die, like a save point in a game, but it would be neat if we could..."

"Hey, we're in luck! One of those 'save points' became active right near here when we beat the boss!" Lambda pointed towards an area relatively free of debris, where a glowing green circle swirled.

They all stood around the save point. Xion closed her eyes. "Let's see, how did Sora do this? There we go!" They all vanished in a burst of green Light.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Training Worlds: Hub..._

The three girls reappeared back in the nondescript, gray room. Behind them was the door back to Midnight Town, and the door on its right now had a glowing sign over it, which read:

 _Training World 2:_

 _Lotus Academy_

However, the detail that captured the girls' attention was in the very center of the room, where Roxas was waiting for them. "Hey, girls! I see you got through the first world!"

Kairi bluntly asked, "Roxas, why are you here? Weren't you going to send us letters and stuff while Merlin trained you on the outside?"

Roxas rubbed his neck sheepishly. "Well, it turned out there were a few reasons why that wasn't going to work. First, I needed more time to learn this Observation stuff. In here, I have all the time in the worlds. I'll just be in that room over there..." Roxas pointed to a new door labeled _Observer Training and Combat Simulator_ , "...doing my thing, while you girls are in the other Training Worlds. I'll be here to greet you each time you finish one, and I'll pass you some notes and instructions Merlin left with me. This is just so much more efficient than what we had planned before.

"Second, it turns out trying to communicate through that bubble caused time to sync up more than we wanted. Time was passing too quickly in here, and it makes it too easy for unwanted things to get in."

Roxas' tone became grim. "Which leads to the biggest problem: two intruders have already entered the Training Worlds. I couldn't stop either of them...they were just too strong."

Lambda got down to business. "What did they look like? Could they be working with Xehanort?"

Roxas replied, "I don't know for sure if they're with Xehanort. They had yellow eyes like his, but they also had _green_ hair. I mean, who has green hair?"

Lambda's stomach dropped. "...I can think of two people fitting that description right off the top of my head. I guess I should have expected Hazama and Terumi to escape from Kokonoe's cage. Are they still working with each other? And what brought them back to this timeline?"

Roxas scratched at his messy hair. "I don't know. Merlin says there's no new Time Break, so they didn't come from the other timeline; they just suddenly started to exist in Twilight Town, and they came right here. Not at the same time, though; I had just gotten my breath back after the one in the yellow coat kicked me into a wall, when the guy in the black business suit casually kicked me in the same spot and _moonwalked_ into the bubble. Neither one really said anything to me."

"Well, that's already odd behavior for them. They both love talking people's ears off about despair and their superiority and all that junk." Lambda growled at the memory of her first encounter with Hazama, back when Terumi was still fused with him. "Do you know where in the Training Worlds they are?"

"They couldn't have gotten into any worlds you haven't visited yet...you should have already run into them in Midnight Town, actually."

"Well, that explains it. Midnight Town is huge," Xion pointed out. "We could have scouted that place for days without even getting close to them."

Kairi worriedly asked, "They sound like really bad people. What should we do if we run into them?"

Lambda replied, "I don't think we stand a chance in combat with them, but running away is probably just as futile; the only reason they would want to be here is if they were after one of us. They're probably looking for _me_ , though I have no idea why. They don't exactly have a high opinion of me."

"We should figure out what they want," Xion suggested.

"In some way that doesn't kill us, hopefully," Kairi added.

Lambda nodded. "Those are both good ideas. But I think we should stay focused on getting stronger for now. They came here immediately after appearing, which probably means they aren't ready to act. Terumi's an ancient incarnation of pure hatred who usually makes elaborate plans millennia in advance; if he's flying by the seat of his pants now, he's got to be in a position of weakness. Even so, he could probably beat us all as we are now. Even Riku at his full power couldn't keep up with Terumi. We need to get strong enough to beat him before he's ready for us."

Namine replied, _"Okay, I think that makes sense, but what about Hazama? Is he an incarnation of evil, too?"_

Lambda tried to explain it. "...Sort of. He's a living Azure Grimoire; a copy of the strongest Grimoire in the Azure Timeline, made of pure seithr. Given how Grimoires work in this timeline, that means he's literally made of the Power of Darkness. Terumi had him created as a vessel for his spirit"

"However, Hazama and Terumi were separated at some point before we fought them both in Twilight Town. They teamed up against Riku, but from what they said, their interests seem to have diverged. I think we'll need to handle Hazama completely differently from Terumi.

"That said, I have no clue what they're after. Terumi's final goal is certain, though: it's nothing short of absolute, all-encompassing despair. If Hazama's any different from Terumi, it'll be a _better_ kind of different."

Lambda paused to catch her breath. "As for weapons, they both use twin butterfly knives up close, and a Nox Nyctores called 'Geminus Anguium: Ouroboros' at a distance. It has the shape of two floating chains, each with a snake head. Hazama and Terumi must have each gotten half of the pair. They can summon the chain from pretty much any place or angle they can see, making it tricky to block, and it has the special ability to 'attack the target's emotions directly'. Needless to say, don't let it touch you."

Kairi shuddered. "That's all...extremely scary. How am I going to get to sleep tonight...?"

Lambda forced a chuckle. "I know, right? Worst. Birthday present. Ever!"

Roxas blinked. "Um, happy birthday, Lambda?"

Lambda rolled her eyes. "Except for the last few minutes, yes. At least I got a bit of a head start on preparations; I managed to link the IDEA Engine to my Keyblade."

Bewildered, Roxas asked, "You did what with the what to your Keyblade?"

Lambda repeated, "The IDEA Engine. Long story short, it can give my weapon a temporary enhancement. Since I lost Murakumo, I linked it to my Keyblade instead. Even I don't know much more than that; Professor Kokonoe built it with the craziest quantum physics mumbo-jumbo that mad scientist could dream up. The fact that I even have it is another mystery; the _other_ Lambda was the one who actually had it installed."

Kairi raised her hand. "Can we hold off on more explanations for now? My brain is full."

Roxas got back to the actual task. "Good idea; from the looks of this next Training World, you're going to need to make room in your brain." He pulled a notecard from his pocket. "'Wisdom from the mouth of the Great Wizard Merlin: Lotus Academy may seem to be a normal school on the surface, but it hides strange secrets. The world itself will immerse you in tests, and the first may be the toughest.'"

Roxas stopped reading. "Well, that was unsettling...and not very helpful at all. You might as well see for yourselves. Good luck in there; I'd better get back to my own training. Keep an eye out for Hazama and Terumi!" Roxas headed toward his personal training grounds, and the door to Lotus Academy began to shimmer.

Kairi grabbed the handle just like last time, but showed less enthusiasm in actually opening the door. "Great, we're headed back to school. I guess we'd better not be late..." Light poured out of the doorway, blinding all three girls.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Lotus Academy: Atrium..._

A red-haired girl blinked her eyes open slowly, seeing two other girls dressed in the same blue-skirted sailor uniform she wore. Oddly, the first thought that came to mind was that she was expecting them to have blonde and black hair, but they were both brunettes; one was shorter than the redhead and had pigtails, the other was much taller and had very short hair.

What was she doing here again?

The short one shouted with no regard to being indoors, "Carrie, we're going to be late! Stacy can't be late again, she's been late twice this week already!" The redhead - _Carrie? Is that really my name?_ \- realized that 'Stacy' referred to the speaker herself, not the other girl.

"You're such a zombie in the mornings, Carrie! C'mon, we're going to miss homeroom! Let's book it, Stacy!"

"Got it, Alex! Stacy's already there!" They both ran down a hall to the right of 'Carrie'; another, identical hallway extended to the left. Behind her were a very large set of wooden doors, probably the entrance to the school, and directly in front of her was a smaller door labeled _Principal's Office._ With no other leads on who or where she was, 'Carrie' followed after the other two girls. Maybe this was all a huge misunderstanding, or maybe her lost memories would return if she kept playing along.

None of this sat well with her, though. Her heart told her that something was very wrong...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: Plot twists ahoy! The next world's got some intrigue to it already; more on that in a month or so, as usual. Here's a freebie: 'Carrie' is actually Kairi, but with her memories suppressed. Hence the name 'Lotus Academy'. If there's an anime or something that already used that name, let me know, but this world is another original creation of mine. That said, there are going to be lots of anime cameos in attendance, and not just the "ordinary high school student" kind._

 _And yes, Hazama and Terumi are here. They're mean, lean, and green, and they've taken a keen - but separate - interest in the girls, and specifically in Lambda. They won't be left behind easily; expect to see them show up in person next chapter!_


	5. Sleeping In Class

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 5: Sleeping In Class**

 **-"I'm Late, I'm Late, I'm LATE!"-**

 _A/N: Indeed I am. VERY late. Here, everyone, have some half-serious apologies! I started_ thinking _about this around Thanksgiving, and now I've even missed Non-denominational Winter Solstice Holiday (NDWSH Day; you might remember that reference from earlier books)._

 _The two girls from the last chapter, Stacy and Alex, were just random OCs with absolutely no significance to this story or any other. They will probably never appear again. Most other characters in this world will be cameos from various animes, though._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Inside Kairi's heart..._

Namine woke up and noticed immediately that something was very wrong. The picture of Kairi on the Station floor was blurred and distorted, which was doubly odd to see happen to stained glass. Namine reached out with her power, reading Kairi's memories to figure out what had happened, and instantly realized the problem.

"Really, Merlin? False memories? Did you forget who I am? You didn't even connect them properly! Or maybe that part's my fault, since I was asleep here when it happened. Anyway..." Namine calmly stretched her arms to wake them up from her nap, knelt down on the floor of the Station, and jabbed her right arm straight into the stained glass with casual ease, creating a ripple effect in the already distorted image. She extracted a glowing string from the unharmed glass; a chain made up of several shining orbs. Most of the memories were bright, clear, and flawless, but the end of the chain was messily tied to another set of dim and misshapen orbs: the false memories of a made-up girl named "Carrie", placed there as an effect of entering Lotus Academy. With such a poor connection and so many missing events in the chain, Kairi probably couldn't even "remember" these. The mess did a good enough job covering up the real memories and keeping them from surfacing, though, resulting in something like amnesia.

Before conducting open-heart surgery to excise the fake memories, Namine pushed her awareness out to what Kairi was doing, just in case. The puffy clouds around the Station vanished, revealing a 360-degree view of Kairi's surroundings. Namine had already made use of this trick several times to maximize the party's situational awareness in combat.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Lotus Academy: Hall 1-A..._

"Carrie" followed the other two girls down the hallway, only to realize she'd been left behind. Evidently, they expected her to already know where her homeroom was. "Um, Stacy? Alex...? What am I supposed to do, just wander around and try to look lost until I find a teacher to ask for directions?!" The hallway was really long, and the numbered rooms all looked alike. This setup seemed familiar somehow in a very unhelpful way, like she'd just had this problem, but she couldn't remember how it should be solved.

 _"No need for that, Kairi. I'll fix this."_

"Carrie" looked all around, trying to figure out where that soft-spoken girl's voice came from. "Who said that?!"

The voice came again, and this time "Carrie" - no, Kairi, that was definitely her real name - realized it was coming from somewhere inside herself. _"My name is Namine...but you already know that. Just a moment... Oh, by the way, you should brace yourself or sit down. When your memories return all at once, you might get very disoriented."_

Kairi took the weird voice's advice by sitting on the floor, wondering if it was okay to smudge the skirt on this uniform with whatever weird germs were - "WHOOOOA!" Vertigo hit Kairi like a sledgehammer, knocking her flat on her back. The ceiling (constructed of an ugly speckled tile) stared down at her, but Kairi was busy reliving the last twelve years of her life, starting from her earliest memory: of the mayor of a small island community smiling down at little, three-year-old, amnesiac Kairi after she washed up on the beach without a boat.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Kairi's memories..._

On the whole, Kairi's life from that moment onward was a lot of the same few activities - a LOT, and now she was stuck in the equivalent of watching an incredibly boring home movie on endless repeat. She spent every afternoon running around the beach, laughing with Sora and Riku, competing with them (read: getting utterly schooled by them) in races and word games, but waving off all invitations to spar with them in play-fights. Good times. Reliable times. Predictable times. But before now, she never really thought they were boring times. She wasn't sure she could go back to those days anymore...

Weekdays were spent in class. Destiny Island Academy was the only school around, and it was here that Kairi outshone the two boys with her stellar academic performance (although Riku was always close behind in second place). She tutored Tidus, Wakka, and Selphie after school sometimes, since their grades were...well, those three weren't quite the sharpest practice swords in the shed.

Around Kairi's thirteenth birthday was when she developed a crush on Sora. Or maybe it started back when they were six-year-olds sketching each other on the walls of the Secret Place, but 13 was when she really started to notice the shift in her feelings. She didn't act any differently around him, but he was constantly on her mind, making her heart beat a little faster each time she looked his way.

Kairi loved that constant sense of wonder that always surrounded Sora. He acted like every new day was a whole new life and the BEST DAY EVER, and he swept everyone else up in his (admittedly aimless) enthusiasm. However, when he made a promise, especially to Kairi, he would see it through, come Heartless or high water. His untameable spiky hair was one of the few true constants of Kairi's universe, and recent events only cemented this fact in her mind. Whenever he smiled, it was like the warm sun embraced her.

Kairi wondered if Sora felt the same way about her, but her silly teenage anxieties kept her from simply asking him about it. It was easy to see now, but only in hindsight.

Riku's affections were more obvious, but Kairi still saw Riku as "one of two best friends who happen to be boys" - which she still insisted was COMPLETELY different from a boyfriend! She got very tired of explaining the difference to Selphie, but eventually convinced her to stop shipping Kairi and Riku...only for Selphie to start shipping Kairi and Sora, which was a whole other level of embarrassing for Kairi. For his part, Sora remained just as oblivious as before.

Kairi stewed in well-hidden emotional discomfort for another year, which of course culminated in the Heartless invasion and destruction of the Islands when she was 14. Things got blurry after that, as she was reduced to a stray heart huddled within Sora. She was one of many, apparently. Sora's heart was absurdly large - large enough for everyone he'd ever met. Large enough that Kairi never met that boy Namine mentioned to Riku (wait, that wasn't something Kairi had been told; were Namine's memories blending into Kairi's from this brute-force use of her power?), and even Sora himself had no clue what was going on.

Sometimes Kairi could tell what Sora was doing, and she could hear his voice all around her, keeping the Darkness away. (Most of the time, he was just yelling things like "Yah! Come on! You're finished! DEEP FREEZE!" But that was beside the point.) Kairi was confused and barely conscious, but safe and happy. And then Sora sacrificed his heart so that Kairi's little lump of distilled Light could return to where it belonged.

Kairi wasn't sure how she had turned that nondescript little Shadow back into Sora. All she knew was that she _knew_ that Shadow was Sora, and that she wanted to keep him safe from the other, bad Heartless and get him back to the way he used to be. There was no big plan involved when she threw her arms around him in the middle of a Heartless dogpile. But it all worked out!

...And then he ran off after Riku, and Kairi had to go back to the Islands alone for another whole school year. Everyone thought her story about Sora was made-up; they had all slept through the Heartless attack before, and so they didn't realize the world had been destroyed and recreated. At least Sora managed to keep that promise charm safe and return it to her at _long_ last. In fact, it was still in the pouch strapped to her...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Back in the present..._

"Oh no, what happened to my dress!? Is it in the bag that came with the uniform?" Kairi fast-forwarded through the last few weeks of her memory: Kairi got kidnapped again, _more than once;_ Sai'x was a huge jerk; apparently Riku had a girlfriend now; Riku gave Kairi a Keyblade; Kairi helped beat Xemnas; now she was with Lambda and two other ex-residents of Sora's heart in the Training Worlds. Everything was in order. She yelped the rather non-sequitur question about her dress out loud while rifling through the spacious black backpack she wore.

Thank goodness, Kairi's real outfit was indeed in the bag, alongside a few (blank) notebooks, textbooks with tiny print that she didn't bother to read, and jar of sloshing green ooze labeled "FOR SCIENCE FAIR PROJECT". A quick look around the area revealed a clearly-marked set of restrooms, so she ducked into the ladies' room and changed back into her normal clothes, storing the uniform in the backpack.

Namine asked, _"All better, Kairi?"_

"Yep! Thanks, Namine! I don't know if I could've broken that illusion, or whatever it was, on my own."

 _"You're welcome! Anyway, we should find the others. Their false memories probably connected properly; my presence messed up the effect somehow, so you just got amnesia, but there was almost a whole fake personality stuck to your heart before I cut it away from your real memories."_

"Let's start looking, then..." Kairi left the restroom, but was almost immediately stopped by an absolutely gigantic upperclassman with really short blond hair, who blocked her path with a thick book as tall as Kairi herself, labeled _RULES AND REGULATIONS!_ Spelled with two exclamation points! The upperclassman's gray uniform was crisp and spotless, despite straining to contain the eight-foot-tall mammoth of a boy.

As it turned out, he had no sense of personal space or indoor volume. His pointer finger dug deeper into Kairi's forehead the longer he spoke, forcing her to step backward every few seconds."YOU THERE! Freshman girl! You are SKIPPING CLASS! And just as bad, you're VIOLATING our school's dress code! That skirt is eleven-point-six-two centimeters TOO SHORT, and it is NOT a sailor uniform in the first place! Maybe you thought you could get away with it. But unfortunately for you, rule-flouting SCUM, you're hiding in the hallway patrolled by the head of the Disciplinary Committee: me! IRA GAMAGOORI! As long as I draw breath, NO student shall defy the rules of Lotus Academy and go unpunished! You just earned yourself a DETENTION!"

Kairi tried to explain that she wasn't actually a student here, but her voice was drowned out by the excessive volume of Ira Gamagoori. (On second thought, her explanation would have only made things worse.) He grabbed her by the upper arm with an iron grip and dragged her back towards the Principal's Office. Kairi hoped she could explain her predicament to the principal, whoever that might be.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A few minutes earlier: Lotus Academy: Hall 1-F..._

Another girl, Ion, huffed and puffed as she dashed around a corner. Her short, black hair was matted to her head with sweat. "Did I lose them?"

No: a trio of her pursuers - shadowy, humanoid monsters - popped out of the ground in front of her, with yellow eyes glowing and wicked claws reaching. Ion looked around for an escape route, but she'd managed to flee from the monsters only to run right into a dead end.

In hindsight, Ion wasn't supposed to be poking around in the janitor's closet when it was time for homeroom anyway, but class was so boring! If only this school was more like her favorite animes. Of course, the alternative to attending boring classes turned out to be getting attacked by monsters, as she discovered when these dark creatures jumped out at her from behind the mops.

"If this was an anime, now would be the part of the first episode where the hero appears to save me..."

*CHING!*

"...Or it could be where I suddenly gain a new superpower that I can use to save myself! That's way better!" Ion looked down at the weapon in her hand...no, this was no mere weapon. This was a Keyblade - though she had no idea where that word came from. Speaking of strange words, the name of this particular Keyblade floated into her head:

 **Forget-Me-Not...**

This Keyblade was wider and longer than the ones the others started with, which was good, because she was used to oversized weapons. ( _The others? Weapons? Oh, that's right..._ She was starting to remember.)

It was like a scale model of the Station Tower in Twilight Town. It was only one half of the tower, though, so the one bell hanging off that side formed the teeth of the key. The hilt, in a jarringly sudden shift, was a blank, white rectangle surrounding a matching white handle, like the halls of Castle Oblivion, and had three points sticking up in the direction of the blade, like the cards that were necessary for everything in that world. An extremely thin cord, like a puppet string, connected the hilt to a Keychain shaped like a bar of Sea-Salt Ice Cream.

On the whole, the weapon's design basically summarized all the things Xion cared about during the brief time she was with the Organization...except the people with whom she shared those memories. Roxas and Axel were already kept safe and pristine in her heart and memories, anyway.

Xion bashed the Neoshadows apart with her new Keyblade, using her mimicry of Sora's fighting style until she could refine some moves of her own. She remembered everything now - courtesy of the Keyblade's power to unlock anything, even abstract things like her memory. Perhaps the temporary amnesia was just what she needed; forgetting about her other weapons made her reach for the Keyblade's formless potential instead. As for those other weapons, she could tell she still had them, but learning to use the Keyblade was the whole point of her being in the Training Worlds...and she couldn't wait to show it off to the other girls!

While she wandered back towards a more-traveled part of the school, Xion debated with herself about keeping the name "Ion". The fake memories that this world had stuck in Xion's head were still there, and were just as well organized as her own and Sora's, so she knew what Ion was supposed to be like. Ion was an anime otaku whose collection of animes put special emphasis on magical girls and similar superheroes. She was also a bit of a punk, tended to exaggerate everything she did, and had a track record of skipping class to sneak around the school's hallways, which was how she'd gotten lost and attacked by the Heartless. That confidence could be useful for Xion.

However, Xion decided that changing her name now would just make things confusing for everyone. After all, aside from Lambda, everyone certainly had a hard enough time remembering the name "Xion," although of course that wasn't their fault. However, she decided to leave her real outfit in her bag where she found it, so she would fit in better with the locals...although she did change the slogan on her shirt to another joke: "Hello, My Name Is: Of No Importance".

She mused to herself, "Now, if I was Kairi or Lambda, who would I be in this world?" Paging through Ion's memories didn't reveal anyone who looked like Kairi or Lambda, and they would have stood out among Ion's classmates, so they must be in different classrooms. This left Xion with no leads...

...Until she heard an excessively loud shout echoing down the hall: "...You are VIOLATING our school's dress code! That skirt..." As the loudmouth barreled on with his speech, Xion winced in sympathy for whoever he'd caught; as Ion, she remembered going to great lengths to avoid getting caught by Ira Gamagoori. No enforcer in the school was quite as duty-driven or unreasonable as that guy.

"...Wait!" Xion realized, "Other than me, there isn't really anyone who would come to school out of uniform. That's got to be Kairi." Of the group, Xion had figured Kairi would be the worst at subtlety, having no experience trying to blend in on other worlds. Xion and Lambda had at least done some sneaking around while working with and against the Organization, respectively, although their Black Coats tended to stand out more than even Sora's outfit would.

Xion would have to sneak into the principal's office to find Kairi; a daunting feat for any student, and especially for an impostor. "Time for a recon mission!" She clutched Forget-Me-Not and crept down the hallway, following the retreating stomps of the Disciplinary Committee's head honcho. She whispered to herself, "I wish I could turn invisible. Maybe there's a spell for that! Err...Disappear? Transparency? Vanish?" That last one worked. Xion grinned invisibly and mentally rewrote her plan of action. There was no need to maintain a cover identity anymore...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Principal's Office: Reception..._

Kairi was shoved into a big chair in front of the secretary's desk, and was immediately locked into place by shackles that snapped around her wrists. She raised an eyebrow at Ira. "Isn't this a bit excessive for a first-offender truant?"

With maximum hypocrisy, Ira shouted back, "BE QUIET! You will remain in that chair until a faculty member is ready to determine what punishment you should receive, if any!" He then stomped out of the room, banging the door shut on his way out.

The secretary's desk was mostly clear except for a little wicker basket, a few slips of paper, and a portable chalkboard with a message on it: "The person sitting at this desk is an experimental automaton. Please rate its service from 1 to 5 and leave a comment in the basket." Having nothing better to do, Kairi examined the robot secretary...and realized it was Lambda! Instead of the dress she'd arrived in, she was wearing a generic, white button-down blouse and black pencil skirt, but her red eyes and extremely long blond braid were instantly recognizable.

"Whoa, Lambda, is that you?" Kairi asked.

"Interaction with students awaiting disciplinary action is prohibited."

"...Well, drat. How can I jog your memory?"

 _"That's an easy one,"_ Namine whispered. _"Use the Keyblade on her. Or at least use it to get out of these shackles."_

Kairi looked around and found a camera in the corner of the room. She whispered back, "I think that would count as 'meddling with the world order', Namine. We shouldn't get the whole school in an uproar by breaking their stuff if we can avoid it."

 _"Good point. I guess I could use my memory powers on her; digital memory is actually easier to affect."_

Suddenly, Xion appeared out of thin air, now dressed in her real outfit with her latest custom slogan. "Hey Kairi, hey Lambda! I just learned something cool: 'Vanish' is a magic spell! And another cool thing..." Xion summoned her Keyblade in a swirl of white and blue trails of Light, twirled it once around her hand, pointed it at Lambda, and fired a Release beam. Lambda shuddered, blinked, and stood up from the desk.

Lambda spoke in her normal voice, with a bit of a sarcastic lilt. "Well, so much for the world order, Xion. Whatever, it's just a Training World anyway." Lambda opened a drawer on the secretary's desk and withdrew her real outfit, then slipped out of the secretary uniform (thankfully, she was still wearing her bodysuit underneath that) and changed clothes. She kept the braid in place, since it was easier to manage than a ponytail.

Kairi, stuck as a captive audience in the chair, winced at her team's utter lack of any social skills. If her hands were free, she would have facepalmed. _I hope you weren't like this with Riku._

"Exactly! Aaand CLICK!" Xion tapped Kairi's restraints with the tip of her Keyblade, causing the chair to wobble once and release its captive. "...The other cool thing is that I got a Keyblade!" Xion belatedly announced, thrusting Forget-Me-Not skyward.

Namine pointed out, _"...Yeah. We can see that. What triggered it to finally appear, though?"_

Xion related the story. "...Afterward, I decided to keep calling myself Xion, but keep the parts I liked from 'Ion'. Hence the...energy. Did I surprise you?"

Lambda nodded firmly. "Excessively so."

Kairi added, "By the way, you said you used a spell called Vanish to sneak in here. Did you _change clothes_ while the spell was in effect? While you were standing right there?"

Xion shamelessly replied, "Yep! Vanish actually lasts a really long time, especially compared to other status-effect spells like your Ignite trick. I slipped in when Ira left. I bet we could use the same trick to get anywhere in this school!"

"Perhaps you could, but would you please humor an old man first? After all, I _am_ the Principal of Lotus Academy."

The three girls stopped moving in shock, then slowly turned around to face the one who had spoken.

The first thing they noticed was that he had blue hair, which looked a bit messy for a school principal. The second thing was that his eyes had a thin spiral pattern running from the very edges of his whites to his pupils. On his back was an old-fashioned, hand-cranked drill with a handle as long as a spear, which was yet another oddity in a school setting. Oh, and he wasn't wearing a shirt, but he had a long, black jacket half-open to show off his chest. He also wore tight leather pants.

Xion decided that overall, the Principal wouldn't be out of place in an over-the-top fighting or giant mecha anime series, but in just about any real-life setting (or even any fantastic world Xion had seen), he was just too cool to exist. In terms of appearance, she figured he would be the protagonist or rival character of said anime, so he was probably a good guy...right?

Lambda noted that he was indeed an old man like he said; his face was crisscrossed with wrinkles, lines, and a few scars, though he wasn't hunched over or weak in any way. His muscles were well-defined, but not bulky, and he carried himself with the air of a seasoned warrior. She tried to scan his threat level, and got back _Error: threat level overload! Repairing broken scanners..._ It shouldn't be possible for any mortal being to be powerful enough to break her sensors! She blurted out, "What _are_ you?!"

Kairi's thoughts were mostly along the lines of _Blue hair? Seriously?_ Ever since being kidnapped by Sai'x, she associated blue hair with villains, but she could sort of tell that the Principal wasn't a villain. He was...something else. However, Kairi first addressed her team. "We're going need to have a serious talk about not being _total weirdos_ in other people's houses, girls!" Then, to the Principal, she added, "Sorry about them, sir. I'm Kairi, and these are..."

The Principal interrupted, "Don't worry, I heard Xion say all your names. Well, my name's Simon. Simon the Digger, if you want to be formal for some reason." He pronounced it _see-moan_ , but he pointed to a nameplate on the door to his office that spelled it as _Simon_. "I can't help but notice that all of you only arrived here today, and yet you've already broken the spell that altered your memories."

Xion thought, _Well, that was ominous._ Her grip tightened on her new Keyblade; what if this Simon guy was the "boss monster" of this world?

Simon's spiral eyes didn't miss Xion's half-baked plan. He smirked confidently. "You can't catch me by surprise, Xion. Just who the hell do you think I am? I don't like hitting girls, but you should know...that my drill is the drill that once pierced the heavens! Besides, all I meant about the spell was that you passed the test!"

"What test, Mr., um... Mr. the Digger?" Kairi asked, finally standing up from the punishment chair. Without waiting for a reply, she rounded on Xion. "Seriously, Xion! You can't solve all your problems by beating them up!"

Simon graciously ignored the statements that weren't directed at him. "Just Simon, please. And yeah, the first floor of this school is one big test! If you broke the spell, then you deserve to know the truth about this place, and you graduate to the REAL Lotus Academy! C'mon, I'll take you to the next floor up."

Simon strode over to the center of the room and took the drill off his back, then stabbed it straight up into the ceiling. There was no slot for the drill or anything - he deliberately stabbed through the plaster and wood above him. The girls couldn't see up there, but a green flash burst out from the cracks, and a metal tube with an open front descended around Simon, with enough room for the girls to get in around him. "There! Now we have an elevator! Spiral Power is pretty convenient like that. Everyone in!"

All the girls were left utterly at a loss for words, so they just mutely entered the tube and allowed themselves to be carried upward by a section of the floor that most definitely wasn't designed to move before Simon worked his "Spiral Power" nonsense.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Lotus Academy: Atrium (Second Floor)..._

The second floor of Lotus Academy was definitely higher-tech than the first. The Atrium had the same layout as below (two hallways leading left and right, and an office in front), but with metal walls, sliding blast doors, and a holographic map of this floor instead of a door leading outside. Simon announced, "And here we are! Welcome to the _real_ Lotus Academy! The layout is the same: classrooms on the right, other facilities on the left. The difference is, instead of a gym, an auditorium, or the like, we have a mixed martial arts arena, a mecha hangar, a virtual combat simulator, and other neat destinations. This is where we train kids with all kinds of extraordinary powers to defend peace and defeat evil wherever it lurks! And you three just earned a scholarship!"

 _"Four,"_ Namine pointed out.

Simon blinked. "Oh, right, you're here, too. I'm afraid I didn't catch your name...?"

 _"My name is Namine. I'm..."_

"Wait, let me guess," Simon interrupted. He pointed at Lambda, "You're a robot girl..."

"Affirmative." Lambda nodded.

Pointing at Xion, the Principal continued, "...You're an artificial human..."

"...Close enough." Xion shrugged.

"...You're a pure maiden who holds the universe together..."

Kairi was impressed. "You can tell just by looking? Have you met other Princesses of Heart?"

Simon pointed a bit lower, "...And you're a personification of part of Kairi's personality."

Namine manifested next to Kairi and nodded. _"All correct, more or less. We're all a bit more complicated than that, but you figured us all out immediately. I can see why you're the principal of a school like this."_

"Well, of course! It helps that I'm more or less immortal, after using a massive amount of Spiral Power all at once. I was once an aspiring hero like you...well, more like I was dragged into heroism by my role model. Big Bro Kamina was...unique. He'll always be remembered by those that followed him...those who followed me after his heroic sacrifice. Anyway, after saving the universe, my team split up. I went wandering the world, and eventually settled down here and started Lotus Academy with a few other friends I met: magic users, mecha pilots, superheroes. They're nice folks, you'll like them.

"But there are those who wouldn't like the idea of a school for the paranormal. The memory spell on the first floor keeps the second floor a secret. That way, we can run a normal school downstairs, and anyone who notices and breaks the spell probably belongs up here anyway. We get a few who just have really strong wills without any superpowers, but that doesn't mean they're any less suited for the curriculum."

Lambda spoke up. "That sounds _awesome_ , and if I had the choice, I'd probably enroll, but we're actually just looking for a very specific thing before we move on to another world. It's not weird that we come from another world, is it?"

Simon laughed. "No, of course not! Among our students are plenty of aliens, a couple ghosts here and there, some nice monsters, and even a few eldritch horrors from outside time and space...whose reputations were greatly exaggerated, thankfully. Sorry for the misunderstanding that you were students here. What exactly are you looking for? Maybe I can help you find it."

Kairi took up the story. "Something called a Practice Keyhole. You see, we're already doing a training course that's taking us to multiple worlds. On each one, we need to fight a powerful Heartless - they're a kind of monster you can recognize by their round, yellow eyes, and most of them have a certain emblem on them..."

Xion interrupted, "And there's an infestation of them on the first floor; you should look into that!"

 _"...And if we find the strongest Heartless on this world and beat it, the Practice Keyhole will appear, so we can unlock it with our Keyblades and move on,"_ Namine finished.

Simon scratched his chin. "Heartless, huh? This is the first I've heard of them. They must not have reached any worlds I know yet. Imagine that! The universe is even bigger than I thought! Don't worry, I'll gather some students together and make a lesson out of exterminating these Heartless. After all, they can't be THAT tough if you fought past them to get here."

Xion nodded. "I've fought much tougher ones on other worlds, but yeah, I think the ones downstairs should be easy to handle, especially with a team."

Simon nodded back and turned to the right-hand corridor. "It is worrisome that they can sneak into the school under my nose. I'm sorry, girls, but I'll have to leave you to your own training and give this my full attention."

Lambda felt sorry for the Heartless being given Simon the Digger's full attention. "Don't worry about us, sir. We'll be fine."

Kairi realized, "Um, do we need a hall pass or anything? That Disciplinary Committee guy stopped me in the hall downstairs."

Simon laughed heartily. "Oh, right! That almost slipped my mind. Here, pin these somewhere." He tossed four little pin buttons shaped like lotus flowers at the girls. Lambda caught hers, Xion dodged hers and picked it up off the floor, Kairi blocked it with her arm and caught it as it fell...and Namine's passed right through her. "Those will let people know it's okay for you to be here. Good luck!" Simon waved goodbye, then dashed down the hall so fast he created a shockwave that knocked the girls off their feet - even Namine.

Namine picked her immaterial self up and returned to Kairi. _"How did he_ do _that?"_

Kairi could only shrug. She pinned both her and Namine's lotus pins to her pink, zipper-y dress.

Lambda groaned and held her head. "He seems to casually warp reality through sheer manliness. I can't even...the world is supposed to make _sense_ , right? RIGHT?!"

"Nope. The world doesn't make sense unless you MAKE it make sense!" Xion punched her open palm. It seemed she had found a role model.

Kairi turned away from the dust cloud Simon left behind, which had yet to settle. "Well, whatever his deal is, we have our own task. Let's find that Heartless."

Xion nodded and led the way to the other hall. "Ten munny says it's in the martial arts arena."

Lambda hung back for a moment. "Give me a second to record the map, and I'll take that bet. Twenty munny on the mecha hangar." With the map committed to memory, she rejoined the others. "The arena is the closest; third door on the left. The first two are the restrooms."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Lotus Academy: Hall 2-B..._

"Wow, that's still quite a walk," Kairi noted, looking down the long, long hall. With the doors so far apart, each room must be huge.

Xion shrugged. "No problem. We could use the exercise. I'm still kind of embarrassed about needing a break after such a short time walking in Midnight Town."

As they walked, Namine spoke up. _"Lambda, I've been meaning to ask you about something. Remember how you used to talk differently sometimes? It was something about protocols."_

Lambda blinked. "Oh, right. I hardly noticed I'd stopped doing that. When I got my Keyblade, it did something to all my protocols so they can't override my actions anymore. I _could_ use robo-speak when scanning and doing other protocol-related things, but I don't _have_ to anymore."

Kairi pointed out, "Maybe you should do it anyway, so we'll know right away when you're doing robot...things."

Lambda giggled. "You and Sora are a perfect fit, you know that? You're both clueless around technology. But your idea does make good sense. I'll go back to making scan reports in robo-speak for easier understanding. Speaking of which..."

She went on to relate the various threat levels she could report: as she'd explained to Riku a while ago, the scale went from F (dead) to D (disabled) to C (untrained civilian) to B (trained soldier) to A (badass) to S (demigod) to SS (godlike). Right at that moment, Lambda considered herself a high C, Kairi a low A, Xion a high A, and Namine would be a C in most combat situations, but technically an S in terms of sheer power. All of them had the potential to reach a strong S or even SS tier if they kept training.

"...And then there's Simon the Digger, who actually broke the scale. How can he even _do_ that? Even Merlin still fits in SS tier, even after all the crazy things I've seen him do, and that's because he focused so much on gaining secret arcane powers that he doesn't actually stand a chance in any sort of combat! How could an illusion created by Merlin have more power than him?!"

Namine had to point out, _"Lambda, you're ranting again."_

"...Oh. Sorry, I just...don't do well with illogical worlds. This is like Wonderland all over again. Well, at least we're here! Hooray for distractions!" Lambda yanked open the door...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: Coming not-very soon: the boss, which is running wild through the school and needs to be chased down. I have a pretty good idea in my head for an original Heartless, so...probably about another month(s)._

 _Known error: up there where Kairi got chewed out by Ira Gamagoori (from_ Kill la Kill; _alongside Simon from_ Tengan Toppa Gurren Lagann, _Ira_ _is_ _one of several anime characters I do not own), I mentioned his rulebook's title is spelled with two exclamation points, but it turns out FFN hates letting two punctuation marks coexist. What a pain! Please mentally double the exclamation points._

 _I'm not. Giving. Up. I_ **WILL** _finish this!_


	6. Caught Napping

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 6: Caught Napping**

 **-"Think I'm Gonna Fight Fair? As If!"-**

 _Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts, BlazBlue, or any of the various bit-character cameos in this chapter. I just write crossover fanfics about them._

 _A/N: Miss me? Blame_ Xenoblade Chronicles 2. _It's a pretty great game, but it eats up a lot of time._

 _Speaking of time, it's time for the boss of Lotus Academy, but first..._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Lotus Academy 1F: Gymnasium..._

"But Mr. Terumi, I can't do a MILLION laps!" Some random pasty-faced kid whined.

"A _literal_ million, kid! Get on it!" Mr. Yuuki Terumi was the very archetype of an evil Phys Ed teacher. "Ugh, dealing with _kids_ day in and day out...what could be worse?"

 _ ***BOOM!** Rattle thump thump bump! Ching ching bang!*_

The noise caused more whining from the kids. "Mr. Terumi, what's that noise? Is someone fighting upstairs?"

Okay, _that_ got his attention. "...There's an upstairs?"

"That would be the first I've heard of it," said a voice very similar to Mr. Terumi's, "and I'm the only janitor employed here." Mr. Hazama stood in the doorway. Only his dusty jacket distinguished him from Mr. Terumi, but the two were definitely not related, at least as far as they knew.

"Interesting. A janitor, you say?" Terumi swept aside his fake memories and turned fully to regard Hazama. To the class he was already trying to forget, he yelled, "Class dismissed! Run along, kids, or you'll be late for lunch." The kids filed out in a relieved but orderly manner. "So you don't quite remember yet? Well, it's not like you matter."

Hazama just smirked. "Ouch, that hurts, Terumi. Right here. Surely you didn't think you were the first to break the illusion? I'm just a better actor than you. So, would I be correct in assuming you want to meet with those girls?"

Terumi huffed. "'Want' is such a strong word. I don't have much choice. You of all people should know why."

"Just wanted to be sure, old buddy. You'll do whatever you want, I'll do whatever I want, and whatever happens, happens. I suppose we'll meet again soon enough."

"Whatever. I needed a good stretch anyway. Twin Fangs!" Terumi kicked upward at the ceiling (the very high gymnasium ceiling), shredding his frumpy workout clothes in the process to reveal that he had on his iconic yellow hoodie the whole time. His kicks, sheathed in slimy magic, left a corrosive residue on the ceiling, letting him shatter it with the impacts. "Ouroboros!" A chain shot out from his sleeve, latching onto something on the secret upper floor and pulling him up out of sight.

Hazama slow-clapped at Terumi's departure. "That's just like you, Terumi. You have all the class and subtlety of a reactive warhead...so you'll be the one those wannabe heroes come after first." He shucked his old janitor's clothes and fed them to Ouroboros, revealing his snappy NOL Intelligence uniform, then moonwalked back out to the hall to find a sneakier way upstairs.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Moments earlier, in Lotus Academy 2F: Martial Arts Arena..._

Lambda yanked open the door and stumbled, slack-jawed, into an enormous amphitheater worthy of a mighty empire, with a massive, sandy-floored circle sunken in the center for the arena and rows and rows of benches, with lotus flower-shaped emblems hanging on banners everywhere. Here and there, groups of kids who looked about the girls' age traded blows with each other, using their bare hands and various bladed weapons, from army knives to zweihanders and everything in between.

Lambda looked down on the fights from the middle row of benches where they'd emerged through the door. "Well, that can't be safe. Scanning...Mild abjuration magic detected. Okay, so they have a field up to make cutting weapons...not cut things. It also weakens most other kinds of magic. I really shouldn't be surprised."

Namine replied, _"That could be a problem. Look over there!"_

After a short pause, Xion mumbled, "Uh, where?"

 _"...Right, you can't see me pointing."_ Namine manifested herself in front of the group and pointed at the highest concentric circle of benches, across from where they'd entered. A giant Heartless was waiting there, fiddling with a flask of some kind of glowing, red potion. It was covered in mismatched clothing from head to foot. It had a wide-brimmed, purple witch's hat and flowing yellow robes, making it seem like a huge _Wizard_ Heartless, but it also had an artfully-distressed biker jacket made of black leather hanging unzipped from its shoulders, and its spindly arms were wrapped in white bandages. Under the hat, the girls could make out a glowing yellow left eye and a red eyepatch over the right eye. The rest of the boss Heartless' face was framed in shadow. It didn't carry a Wizard's signature staff, but it did have a bandolier of colorful potions in long-necked glass flasks slung across its chest. The potions swung on flimsy-looking strings and clinked together as the boss moved. The Heartless Emblem was on the buckle of an extra-wide, brown belt tied around its waist...although the belt itself seemed to serve no purpose whatsoever.

Xion turned to Lambda and calmly told her to, "Pay up. I won the bet."

Lambda gazed up at the Heartless. "I would, but there's no munny in the Training Worlds, remember? And we haven't figured out how our TP accumulates yet. For all I know, we could all have one big account for everyone. Instead, let's figure out what the deal is with this Heartless. Scanning... Target identified as the _Trouble Brewer._ Threat level: A. Physical strength: C-tier. Magical strength: A-tier. Bottles contain volatile chemical solutions imbued with different types of magic."

Kairi summoned Destiny's Embrace. "Sounds like the potions are the biggest problem. Just get far away from where it tosses them, I guess."

Namine disappeared while telling the others, _"Yes! Do that, now!"_ The red potion was already sailing through the air toward the heroines' party.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Defeat the Trouble Brewer!_

 _ ***BOOM!***_ Although the girls all scattered in different directions long before the bottle landed, they underestimated the sheer explosive power of the potion inside. A fiery blast swept through the stands, covering at least a quarter of the room. The building was left undamaged, since it was designed to withstand ridiculously powerful blasts from untrained students; the girls weren't so lucky.

The girls were tossed through the air into the arena, landing close to each other as their Keyblades tumbled out of their hands and rattled along the ground. Kairi and Lambda landed pretty softly on their backs, but Xion landed on her head with a _*bump*_ , leaving her too dazed to get up.

Lambda and Kairi pushed themselves up and re-summoned their Keyblades with matching _*ching*_ sounds. Lambda raised her Keyblade and pumped extra mana into it to try and cast a higher-level Fire spell. She managed to cast Firaga, which created a big fireball that zoomed over to the Trouble Brewer and blew up on its eyepatch with a * _bang*_ , engulfing the Heartless' head in flames.

Lambda reported the results: "Minimal damage inflicted. Thank goodness for the suppression field that kept us from getting roasted by the potion, but like Namine mentioned, it's mostly going to work against us. And now I'm out of mana." She made a note of the sensation of her mana slowly recharging. It felt like a fatigued muscle cooling down after hard exercise; it wouldn't be useful until it had properly rested. _There has to be a way to actively pull in mana from the environment and speed this process up._ "Kairi, I don't suppose you have a brilliant plan to actually hurt this thing?"

Kairi was about to respond, but she was cut off by one of the students, who had all stopped sparring with each other to watch the newcomers.

A short-haired girl in a white T-shirt with purple sleeves called out, "I have a plan: PUNCH IT IN THE FACE!" She then literally flew up to the stands where the Trouble Brewer was busy untying a new potion from its bandolier, tightened her fingerless gloves into fists, and slugged the boss in the face...causing minimal damage.

"Videl, get back here! It's too dangerous!" A tall, muscular boy with extra-spiky black hair and plain workout clothes yelled up at the girl.

The girl, Videl, craned her neck around to glare at the boy. "Aw, c'mon, Gohan, you big baby! We can totally take this g-GAAAH!" The Trouble Brewer had finished preparing a yellow potion and smashed the flask straight into Videl's stomach. Lightning visibly arced all over her body for a moment, and she was sent careening back into the arena, where Gohan easily caught her with one hand and set her on her feet.

Videl seemed winded and her clothes were charred, but she was otherwise okay. "I know, I know. You were right. C'mon, we've got to find an instructor to help! Of all the times for Thor to take a restroom break...!" The martial artist couple flew out the door and down the hall, waving for the other students to follow.

Kairi had just made up her mind to get into mid-range and try to inflict a negative status, but the problem was suddenly yanked out of her hands as the floor beneath the Trouble Brewer exploded upwards. The Heartless continued to float in place, heedless of the various construction materials bursting upward, which didn't work out so well for it when a green blur shot up from the hole and ripped straight through the boss from bottom to top. The streak embedded itself into a horizontal flagpole, revealing itself as a black snake head on the end of a glowing green chain, which began to pull its owner up.

A lanky man in a yellow jacket zipped up the chain, ripping the Trouble Maker in half with one of his knives on the way up, and landed nimbly on the flagpole. "YEEHAW! Gotta hand it to Nine, she made some neat toys...before I killed her!"

Lambda froze up for a moment. "Scanning... Target identified as Yuuki Terumi. Threat level maximum. Recommendation: tactical retreat."

Kairi had no past experiences with Terumi to make her fear him. Instead, she chose to notice, "He just beat the boss! Doesn't that totally throw off the whole Training Worlds concept? What happens now?"

Terumi scowled down at her."Say what, girl?"

*KZZZT*

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Mission Failed. Try again._

 _[Lambda's perspective] Principal's Office: Reception..._

Lambda opened her eyes to find she was once again seated at the secretary's desk in front of Simon's office. This time, however, her memories were unaltered, including the memories of what had happened upstairs. She murmured, "So that's how it works. Kudos again, Merlin. This world you've created really is impressive. Now, how should we go about this differently to get it right this time...?"

Lambda decided to stay put, since she was already at the place where they'd been brought to the second floor, and Kairi and Xion would know where to find her. To pass the time productively, she ran through a mental list of her current bag of tricks.

 _Running checksum... Keyblade: status normal. IDEA Engine linked; standing by. Known functions: temporary 40% increase to striking force with Keyblade. Running simulations. Results: 50% increase in spell potency, 20% increase in maximum mana pool, 60% increase in mana recharge rate. Estimated duration: 15 seconds using basic functions. Requires a cooldown period of up to 30 seconds after duration expires. Other functions detected; unable to identify. Recommendation: experiment._

Lambda nodded to herself. "Well, that's actually plenty to work with, at least for now. What I really want to do is expand my mana pool." She remembered that expending her mana was similar to muscle fatigue, so she thought up a practical way to "exercise" that muscle: she produced a small flame over her hand and kept it burning until her mana ran low, then pushed herself to maintain the spell as long as she could. Once she ran out of mana, she waited a minute to recover before conjuring the flame again.

She was pleased to note that she was able to hold the flame almost fifteen seconds longer on the second try. Therefore, either her mana pool had expanded, or she'd simply learned how to do that particular homemade spell more efficiently. A more in-depth checksum told her that both guesses were correct

Unfortunately, checking a history of resource use over the last day (being part machine had a lot of advantages, especially now that no one could walk up and start pushing her buttons) showed that the basic Fire spell and the other spells she'd discovered hadn't gotten any more efficient...probably because they weren't hers. Ancient mages or Keyblade Masters must have made those spells, refined them to peak efficiency, and bound them to the World somehow to preserve them for the next generation. Lambda mumbled a quick thank-you to the old masters, just in case. Well, even if she couldn't improve on the basic combat spells, expanding her mana pool would let Lambda use those spells more often, which made this new form of training very important. She started to come up with ways to stretch her magic during those boring times when the Heartless weren't actively attacking her group (such as her current situation).

As a result, when Ira Gamagoori slammed open the door and dragged both Kairi and Xion to the discipline chair, the first thing they all noticed was the secretary's faintly glowing, pale green aura. Ira blinked once, twice, three times...and then decided he was better off not asking. He snorted, turned away from the desk, and poked a switch on the wall, which caused another discipline chair to rise out of a hatch in the floor. Kairi remarked, "This school really does have it all, doesn't it?"

Just like before, Ira replied with a hypocritical, "BE QUIET!" He locked the two not-truants into the chairs and banged the door shut on his way out.

Lambda remarked, "He got you too this time, huh, Xion?"

Xion grumbled, "Yep. He may be a bit thick, but he really is good at his job. Which works out well for us...aside from being locked in these chairs."

Lambda started to stand up. "Don't worry, I'll open it."

Xion shook her head. "Wait, I want to try something Sora did in Halloween Town once." She summoned her Keyblade, although her hand was still bound in the shackles in such a way that she couldn't point the Keyblade at anything useful. Pointing and shooting wasn't her plan, though.

Xion charged Light in the tip of Forget-Me-Not, which fired a beam sideways, straight up at the ceiling. About halfway up, the beam split into several little, shining drops that landed on the various bindings holding Kairi and Xion in the chairs. A series of clicks followed, and both girls were free.

Kairi stood up and rubbed her wrists. "Ugh, that guy! Didn't anyone ever tell him to treat girls gently?"

Lambda rolled her eyes. "Come on, you're a Keyblade wielder. You need to be tougher than that."

Kairi huffed, "Says the only one of us who never got grabbed. And would you care to explain why you're glowing?"

"Oh, that." Lambda stopped glowing. "I was exercising my magic; I've got a lot of training to do. After all, if we go charging in like we did last time, then either Terumi will ruin everything again or the Trouble Brewer will just blow us up."

Simon the Digger asked from behind Lambda, "Terumi? Trouble Brewer? Last time? ...Oh, don't mind me. I'm just curious. You girls just broke the record for the fastest time to dispel the fake memories this school put in you."

Xion sheepishly replied, "It's...complicated, Principal Simon. The short version is, the three of us are off-worlders, and we're here to fight a monster called the Trouble Brewer, which is in the arena on the second floor of this school. It's very important that _we_ have to beat the monster without help, or everything will happen again."

Simon nodded. "Ah, say no more. Your story isn't that strange compared to my usual students, and lengthy explanations aren't my style anyway. Since it seems you already know what the school is all about, and you don't seem like bad kids, I'll let you up to the second floor." Simon drilled an elevator into the ceiling like before.

"The abridged version of the explanation went more smoothly than I thought it would," Lambda whispered as the elevator took them up.

Xion whispered back, "When dealing with a shonen protagonist, the less complicated you try to be, the better."

Lambda blinked. "When dealing with a what?"

"Never mind. It's an anime thing." In a louder voice, Xion reminded Simon about the hall pass pins, which he provided.

"Well, good luck with that monster! Remember to kick logic to the curb and go beyond the impossible!" After dispensing that bit of manly wisdom, Simon dashed out of sight, once again knocking all four girls to the floor.

Namine had been knocked clean out of Kairi's heart by the shockwave. As she vanished again, she mumbled, _"I thought he might make more sense the second time, but..."_

"Don't think about it don't think about it don't think about it..." Lambda chanted to herself.

"Hey," Kairi called after Xion, who was already charging ahead, "wait for us! We still don't have a plan!"

Lambda hummed to herself. "Actually...well, I'll explain after we catch up to her." They dashed down the hall.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Hall 2-B..._

"So what's this plan of yours?" Xion asked her companions after they caught up.

Lambda and Kairi took a moment to get their breathing under control. When she was calm again, Lambda replied, "We should find this 'Thor' person. That girl, Videl, was talking about how he was taking a restroom break, right? If we find him, he can turn off the suppression field so we can do some actual damage to the Trouble Brewer."

Kairi raised her hand. "Does that mean we have to go into the men's bathroom?"

Lambda shook her head. "Not necessarily. We could always make some noise in the hall to get his attention. Here's the restrooms..." She raised her voice and shouted at the generic stick man-marked door, "Hey, Mr. Thor? Are you in there?"

A muffled, but still loud voice replied, _"That's 'Mighty Thor Odinson, God of Thunder' to you!"_

Lambda blinked. "I just wanted you to know that there's a nasty monster invading the martial arts arena, but my group have to be the ones to kill it, or it won't work!"

 _"One moment, if you would. Cursed toilet paper! I will unroll you with speed to make Sleipnir envious!"_ For the next ten seconds, a multitude of unusual sounds filtered through the door. The girls' expressions became gradually more incredulous as they picked up the sounds of a hammer, a chainsaw, a siren, and a cat. The party unanimously decided they would be better off not knowing what he was doing in there.

But finally, Thor (AKA "The Mighty Thor Odinson, God of Thunder") slammed open the restroom door and stood picturesque in the door frame, wearing some kind of jumpsuit-armor-costume-thing with several big circles on the front and a tiny helmet with winged ornaments. He had enough muscles to make it obvious that he could totally handle the Trouble Brewer if not for the fact that it would cause a time loop.

Thor scowled at the girls. "What sorcery is this?! You three are not any students of mine!"

Namine manifested herself. _"Four, actually. And no, we're just here to beat the monster, since it's from off-world just like us. Please let us handle it; if someone else beats it, it will just cause...problems."_

Thor rubbed his manly chin in contemplation. "What manner of being are you? An apparition? No, it matters not. You seem sincere, oddly enough. And you have visitors' passes. But if you four must be the ones to defeat this monster, then why have you come to me for aid?"

Lambda explained, "There's a suppression field covering the arena that reduces the effectiveness of our attacks, but the monster is so strong that it can still do serious damage with the field up. We overheard that you're the instructor for the class in the arena, so we thought you could help us take the field down temporarily. Or at least evacuate the class."

Thor nodded seriously. "Ah, the field must have slipped my mind. I can certainly do those things...but are you sure you can handle such powerful attacks without the field to weaken them?"

Kairi nodded. "I think so. I have a couple things I can use to try to speed us up and do more damage."

Xion blinked at her. "You do? That's news to me."

Kairi grinned back at her. "You're going to love what I have in mind...well, if it works."

Thor struck a dramatic pose with a big one-handed maul. "Good! Let battle be joined! I shall sally forth and make the preparations. The arena will be ready when you arrive. Blessings of Asgard upon you all...you'll probably need it." He moved as if to throw his hammer (Mjolnir, if Lambda had her mythologies straight), but rather than let go of it, he allowed the impossibly heavy artifact to drag him along with all its ridiculous momentum, and sent himself flying down the hall at an insane speed.

Kairi stared after him. "Well, I suppose that's one way to fly. Will he be alright?"

Xion shrugged. "He calls himself the God of Thunder. If he's even a fraction as impressive as his title, he'll be fine."

Lambda reported, "Target threat level: SS. He is literally a god. Good thing my programming can't force me to try and kill gods anymore. But we do need to pursue him. I hope your plan works, Kairi." The girls rushed down the hall to the arena.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Martial Arts Arena..._

"Get ready to land on your feet, everyone." As soon as the party filed into the arena, Kairi cast the strongest Aero spell she could muster, flinging everyone to the far corners of the amphitheater. She sent herself flying straight at the Trouble Brewer, which was exactly where it had been last time.

Kairi did a twist in midair to dodge the first potion, surprising even herself with such a deft maneuver, and called on that Light she supposedly had so much of. _Think of Sora and all the awesome skills he's gained. Think of that Paopu fruit I'm going to share with him. Think of the faith I have that we'll all succeed in our tests. Think of -_

Ouroboros zipped up through the floor ahead of schedule. Kairi had to make an attack before the Heartless could be destroyed, but all she could think to say was, "HOLY...!"

 ***PSSSEEEEEEEWWWW!***

A brilliant, blue-white pillar of Light lanced down from the indistinct ceiling overhead and consumed a two-meter-wide circle around the boss, including Terumi's head as he pulled himself up. Kairi touched down on the other side of the hole as the badly damaged Heartless vanished. Kairi belatedly finished her exclamation, "...Holy smokes."

"*Cough!* What the hell was that?" Terumi griped as he used one arm to pull himself out of the hole and the other to hold a nasty-looking burn mark on his forehead.

Kairi, ever the well-mannered Princess of Heart, actually apologized to Terumi. "I'm sorry, Terumi...um, I think. Should I be sorry? I was trying to use a generic blast of Light, like King Mickey does, but...well, it looks like Holy is another spell. I didn't expect you to come up early."

Terumi groaned in frustration. "Ugh, you're such a goody-two-shoes! It makes my skin crawl! Actually, this whole world is a major pain in the ass! No one told _me_ that the boss had to be killed by you little shits, so I ended up teaching P.E. to a bunch of brats again! So this time, I was going to jump in and beat you up at the same time as the boss, but you killed the damn mood with that move. I'll be back!" The ancient incarnation of hatred shoved himself back down the hole with a petulant _humph._

Xion and Lambda approached the hole and joined Kairi in staring at the damage. Xion mumbled, "What? We won...?"

Lambda turned toward the door."Scanning...survival of target confirmed. The boss teleported to another room. But you got Terumi to back off! Great job, Kairi! Way to improvise!"

Kairi sighed. "I wish I could say I meant to do that...but I'll take what I can get. What's that guy's deal, anyway?"

A male voice drawled from right behind them, "His deal's the same as always. 'World of despair, death is the only truth, blah blah blah.' He sure has gotten rusty, though. I could have salvaged that plan after the initial stumbling block."

Xion turned around, and found Hazama practically pressed against her back. She made to shove him away, only to receive a powerful kick that sent her flying to the other side of the hole. Hazama continued talking in an obviously false apologetic tone, "Oh, I'm so sorry! I just really, _really_ hate being touched. You kids should be more careful around an Azure Grimoire, anyway. I might end up eating your souls, don't you know?"

Kairi replied in confusion, "Thanks for the concern, I guess? You shouldn't kick my friends, though."

Hazama smiled in bemusement, with his eyes still apparently shut. "Huh, I kind of expected more aggression. Number Eleven must have told you about me, hasn't she?"

Lambda confirmed, "I told them what I know. What I don't know is why you're here in the first place. I heard that you and Terumi came straight here after you suddenly popped into existence in the Heart Timeline. What do you two want with us?"

Hazama smirked his most infuriating smirk. "First of all, Terumi and I aren't in cahoots or anything like that anymore. We just happen to be in the same situation. Surely you've noticed by now? You said it yourself: we only just started to exist in this timeline. And who else could we have to thank for that but _you_ , Number Eleven? I don't know what you did to yourself in this timeline, but you've become such a powerful Observer that you ended up anchoring us to this timeline without even trying."

Lambda's crimson eyes widened. "So I'm your primary Observer? That explains a lot."

Xion cut in, "Really? I'm still lost."

Lambda sighed. "I'll fill you in when we have time - we still have to beat that boss, after all. As for you, Hazama, it's clear to me that you only showed up now so I would confirm your existence. Now that I have, why are you still here?"

Hazama held a hand to his heart, looking like the very picture of innocence...if that picture was left in a pile of garbage. "I just wanted to make it clear that I, for one, have no intention of interfering with your little tests. I wouldn't want to cause any misunderstandings, would I?"

Lambda translated that, "In other words, you want to preserve your own existence, so you're trying to use emotional manipulation to make me less likely to pull the plug."

Hazama seemed surprised, but in a pleasant way. "Ah, you sussed me out in one try! I had you pegged for the heroic type, but maybe you take more after your boyfriend? Oh well, back to the drawing board. So, are you?"

Lambda replied, "Am I going to stop Observing you? No, not unless there's no other choice. That would definitely make you both cease to exist, but I would also end up erasing myself and Roxas, and Xion through him. Plus, I know Riku would miss me. He might even succumb to the Darkness, although I have faith that he's stronger than that. So I'm not going to rule out the possibility, but it would definitely be my very last resort."

Kairi's breath caught in her throat. "Lambda, would you really go through with that?"

"I hope not," Lambda replied, "But with Terumi involved, I have to consider the worst-case scenario. Don't worry, the only kind of situation where I'd do that is one where the people I mentioned already ended up dead. So Hazama, if you see Terumi, tell him to leave my friends alone!"

"I'll be sure to do that, Number Eleven. Are you sure you don't want me to stick around, though?"

"Call me Lambda; I'm not exactly a Murakumo Unit anymore. As for sticking around, I was planning to invite you to join our team," Lambda casually replied.

Hazama, Kairi, Xion, and Namine all simultaneously shouted, _"WHAAAT?!"_

Lambda pointed out, "Well, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Or have 'em join you. There are a lot of reasons for it. It's a way to strengthen our side, it reduces threats to us, it's the heroic and nice thing to do, Xehanort would never see it coming, and on top of all that, it's what I _want_ to do."

Hazama looked intrigued. "And you're truly okay with that, Lambda? I did _kinda_ cut your throat open a while ago. And I also helped Terumi play hacky-sack with your boyfriend's face. And I'm not ashamed to say it felt good to do those things."

Lambda smiled back. "I still think there's a chance for you to change. Terumi seems stubbornly stuck in the past, but you're already trying different things, aren't you? If you think about it, we have very similar circumstances, what with being created by Relius to serve a purpose other than our own wills." With a joking lilt, she continued, "Besides, my neck is obviously still fine, and Riku was just borrowing the face you used as a hacky-sack. He got rid of it already. And my last reason...you already got my name right. You already want to say yes."

Hazama blinked, opened his mouth, shut it again, then turned away from the group and looked upward. "Damn, you're perceptive. Can't pull one over on you, can I, Lambda... Well, I guess that settles it. I'll tag along for now, and maybe carve up some Heartless if it strikes my fancy. Unless there are any objections?" He turned back to the group and extended a hand for a handshake...while twirling a butterfly knife around the other hand.

"None that I can think of right now," Kairi nodded, placing her hand on top of Hazama's without hesitation. "At least you'll be...interesting...to have around."

Xion grumbled as she skirted around the hole, "I'll be fine as long as you keep the knives away from me. And any other weapons," she added quickly as Hazama's smirk started widening. Still, she added her hand to the pile.

Lambda arched an eyebrow as she stepped forward. "...We're going to have to work on your people skills. Like, _not_ threatening your new teammates with sharp death. That said, welcome to the team, Hazama. All for one and one for all, and all that." She placed her hand on top of the others, and they all raised their hands up before stepping back. "Now, we have a Heartless miscreant to track down. I think it went to the mecha hangar. I guess nobody won that bet."

Xion flinched. "Seriously? We'd better get over there before a giant robot steps on it and resets everything again! C'mon!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Lotus Academy 2F: Mecha Hangar..._

One door down and across the hall from the Martial Arts Arena, the newly-expanded team of probably-Junior Heroes entered the _Mecha Hangar._ The room was enormous, absolutely dwarfing the Martial Arts Arena. This was because it had to hold dozens of giant, humanoid machines along the sides. At the start of the row on the left was one tiny, red mecha that looked more like a disembodied head of some of the others with stubby arms and legs, yet this one had more presentation put into the golden storage harness; a golden plaque over it declared its name was "Lagann; PROPERTY OF THE PRINCIPAL". On the opposite side of the room was a similar harness for somewhat larger red mecha that seemed to have no head, instead having a face built into the torso. For some reason, the face wore snazzy, triangular shades over its yellow eyes. A plaque styled like flames informed the visitors that this mecha was "Gurren - MANLY PILOTS ONLY!"

There was room in the middle of the hangar for maintenance equipment and launch pads. The back wall was taken up by a huge metal gate that looked like it could withstand more than a few rams and punches from the mechas in the hangar. Engineers in heavy-duty work clothes scurried here and there, carrying tools and driving forklifts to keep the mechas in tip-top shape. Teenage student pilots in colorful suits hung out in groups, going over strategies for the next combat exercise. But where was the Trouble Brewer? A tricky Heartless like that, running loose in a place like this? It could end up breaking a lot of very expensive toys.

Or driving them! One of the mechas, a comparatively short, blocky white robot with a V-shaped golden fin on its helmet, stomped its way out of its harness, breaking cables and bars as it went.

A redheaded girl in a shiny red rubber suit yelled, "Hey! Who's trying to launch the vintage Gundam without authorization!? The rest of us aren't ready to go yet!"

A voice came over the P.A. "This is not part of the exercise! There's a serious problem! The pilot isn't responding! Anyone who's already in a mecha, provide fire support to subdue the Gundam! Everyone else, evacuate immediately! Clear the room!"

As it turned out, no one else was in a mecha at the time. Xion mumbled, "So much for fire support..."

Lambda looked up at the "Gundam's" head. "Scanning..." Oh, the cockpit was actually inside the torso. "Adjusting...Primary target recognized. The Trouble Brewer is piloting that mecha somehow! And here I thought we'd just have to contend with its own potion bombs. Anyway...targeting rogue mecha. Designation: _Gundam_. Target's threat level is S. Numerous integrated and carried mecha-sized weapons detected. Energy sword, rifle, grenade launcher, machine gun, energy-tipped spear, flail, head-mounted flak guns...Geez, that's a lot of weapons! Luckily, it can only use a few at once, because most of them have to be carried in its hands. Still, those are mecha-sized bullets. One hit, and we're all dead."

"Then scatter!" Kairi summoned her Keyblade and ran at a diagonal, trying to circle around behind the mecha's giant legs. Unfortunately, summoning her Keyblade got the attention of the Heartless at the controls. It turned to face her, each plodding step covering more ground than ten of Kairi's strides. Looking up at the glowing yellow eye cameras of the Gundam, she realized she was in over her head. "A little cover would be nice!"

"Sonic Blade!" Xion summoned her sword and wings to launch herself up at the Gundam's head. While it was an effective distraction, completely shifting the boss' attention away from Kairi, Xion's stab didn't do any damage. And now the head of the Gundam had its mounted guns pointed directly at her. "Nice try!" Xion dismissed her wings and went into free-fall to get clear of the Gundam's aim, briefly summoned her Keyblade, and called, "Wind!" A miniature tornado burst up from beneath her, giving her a bit of a boost when she re-summoned Sonic Blade to take to the air again. She then switched to Ouroboros and began to levitate at chest level to the mecha, charging up energy in the jaw-sword. "Ragnarok!" A swarm of orange bolts trailed through the air and exploded on the mecha's thick armor, doing no more damage than Xion's first stab. She summoned Sonic Blade again and tried to get some distance. "Grr! I just don't have the firepower to get through!"

Lambda brought up her holographic keyboard, but shook her head. "I need to get closer to even try and hack this thing, and at that range it'll just step on me!"

Hazama scratched his chin for a minute, then shrugged. "I think I can hold it down for a bit. Ouroboros!" A chain lashed out, grabbed onto thin air, and pulled Hazama toward Gundam's giant feet. "Eternal Coils of the Dragon Serpent!" He summoned a green glyph on the ground under the Gundam's left foot, launched Ouroboros at it, and yanked himself forward again...but rather than do an ineffective knife combo on the foot, he just kept flying past it. The chain embedded in the armor just got longer and longer as Hazama swung all the way around the other leg.

Namine gasped. _"I see; he's going to tie its legs together and trip it!"_

Kairi nodded approvingly. "Good thinking! If you don't have a mecha of your own to fight on equal terms, the next best thing is always to go for the legs."

"Where'd you learn that?" Xion asked, landing beside her as Hazama swung past them again.

Kairi simply answered, "Video games. Mostly the _Star Wars_ ones. It works on four-legged robots; two legs should be even easier."

"Hazama swung by again, yelling over the roar of his own adrenaline, "ONE...MORE...PASS!"

Lambda sprinted to the Gundam's left side and brought up her keyboard again as Hazama finally stopped swinging. "On your mark, get set, HACK!" Hazama touched down and affixed the other end of Ouroboros to the floor. As the mecha turned to where the travelers were all grouped up, it got tangled in the chain, which stretched taut but showed no signs of breaking. Hazama smirked up at it. "No dice, big guy. You'd need enough power to destroy the world to even think of breaking out of my coils!" The mecha tipped ponderously forward, wobbled for a bit, then fell down on its face with a deafening crash.

Kairi sprinted over to Hazama. "That. Was. AWESOME!"

"I know, right? Go ahead, praise me some more! I'd hoped joining this team would be more entertaining than watching from the sidelines, and it's pretty clear I was right!"

Meanwhile, Lambda was busy with her hacking attempt. "Almost got it...there! All movement and weapon controls are locked. Now it's just a matter of..." she summoned Elysium and fired a Release beam at the Gundam's torso. A whir of motors could be heard, and the mecha's chest plate opened up to reveal the Trouble Brewer seated among the complicated controls. It ripped a blue potion off of its bandolier and tossed it angrily at Lambda.

"Stop!" Xion brandished Forget-Me-Not and cast a time-stopping spell on the tiny flask, halting its movement in midair. "Kairi, if you would..."

"Sure thing!" Kairi leaped into the cockpit and drove Destiny's Embrace through the Trouble Brewer's cloak and out the other end, leaving a rip in the chair it sat on. Its captive heart rose out of the wound and floated upward, disappearing in front of one of the bright fluorescent lights on the ceiling. "We got it this time! Good thing, too; how could it possibly have topped its own pranks again?"

 _"We're probably better off not knowing,"_ Namine replied, _"But the Practice Keyhole is over there on that tiny mecha, Lagann."_

Sure enough, the familiar, glowing outline showed up on Lagann's giant nose. Xion pointed her new Keyblade and locked it, causing a distinctive _*click*_. Xion waited for a bit, commenting, "Right around now is when Sora would usually get a new Keychain to transform his Keyblade. Too bad these Training Worlds aren't the real deal."

Kairi nodded. "Too bad, and not just for that. I mean, they teach kids to pilot giant mechas here! So cool!"

"Yep, but we've still got to move on soon," Lambda reminded them. "Let's find a save point and get report back to Roxas. But where's a save point?"

The tiny mecha, Lagann, shuddered all of a sudden. It's metal mouth opened, and for lack of a better term, it...barfed sparkly Spiral Power all over the floor in front of it. The puddle of sheer manliness vanished quickly, but left behind a swirling, green save point.

Namine wondered, _"Is it...sentient? Well, thank you very much, Lagann."_ The mecha nodded in Kairi's direction, settled back into its harness, then went motionless again. Kairi nodded back, stepped into the save point, and disappeared into green sparkles.

Xion blinked. "Okay... I'm just going to use this convenient save point to get back to the hub. I've got to show off my new Keyblade to Roxas!" She skipped excitedly into the swirl and vanished.

"Don't think about it don't think about it..." Lambda mumbled again as she disappeared.

"Heh heh... _now_ things are getting interesting." Hazama moonwalked into the save point and vanished as well.

"SHIT!" Terumi cursed as his attempt to grab his old vessel with a chain was just a second too slow. "I must be having an off day." He skulked off toward the Dark Corridor he had ripped open between this world and Midnight Town. He had a lot to think about.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: About a month and a half passed again. Thank you all for your patience!_

 _Another Disclaimer, Just For Good Measure: As you'd expect, I still don't own anything related to_ Kingdom Hearts, BlazBlue, Gundam, Tengan Toppa Gurren Lagann, Kill la Kill, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Dragonball, Marvel Comics, Nordic mythology, etc. etc. All characters used without permission, but not for profit. They're all probably quite OOC, too. I'm not really well-versed in any of those franchises other than KH and BB.


	7. Dream Bigger

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 7: Dream Bigger**

 **-"You'll Pay For This!"-**

 _A/N: Wouldn't you know it, just as I was getting ideas to continue this,_ Xenoblade Chronicles 2 _received a massive update and DLC pack that fixed almost all the problems with the vanilla game. So it pulled me back in for a while. My first playthrough clocked over 200 hours(!), so I expect New Game Plus to take almost that long._

 _I should probably warn everyone that Hazama and Terumi tend to swear a lot, in case you didn't notice._

 _Disclaimer: basically the same as every disclaimer you've ever read._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Training Worlds: Hub..._

Roxas was there to greet the girls again as they appeared via a save point the center of the Hub room. Kairi just waved and stood next to him to wait for the others.

Xion skipped out of the green pillar of the warp effect and smooched Roxas on the cheek as a hello, catching him off-guard, but he recovered his wits before anyone else showed up.

Lambda appeared, then stepped aside and watched the warp point intently. Roxas asked, "So how was-"

Lambda interrupted, "Wait for it."

"What am I supposed to be-"

Hazama appeared facing away from the group as the save point disappeared, with one hand on his hat to pull the brim further over his eyes. "Hello, Training Worlds! Here's the man of the hour!"

Roxas' azure eyes bugged out. "He's here!"

Lambda giggled. "Roxas, meet our newest teammate, Hazama."

Roxas' reaction was exactly the same as everyone else's had been. " _WHAAAT?!_ "

Hazama turned around and smiled his sneaky smile. "That's right! Roxas, was it? Before you accuse me of anything, this was Lambda's idea, not mine. No mind control or anything - she came right out of left field with the suggestion!"

Roxas raised one eyebrow. "...And you just said yes when she asked?"

Hazama shrugged. "Well, not at first, but then she rattled off every single reason to recruit me that _I_ would have had in her situation. Of course, she had one or two heroic, nice extra reasons, but she nailed all the sneaky and pragmatic ones. She clearly meant what she said, too. It's true, after all; whoever this Xehanort guy you're all so concerned about is, he'd never have predicted this. Hell, _I'd_ never have predicted this. Oh, and just FYI, Terumi is _not_ on our team. He's pissed. And he'll be even more pissed when that potion bomb un-Stops over his foot!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Meanwhile, in Lotus Academy: Mecha Hangar..._

The Stop effect on the Trouble Brewer's last potion ran out just as Terumi turned around. The resulting explosion created a massive, spiky ball of ice that trapped Terumi inside. (It also ruined the cockpit of the disabled Gundam, much to the dismay of Lotus Academy's faculty.)

Terumi fumed inside his icy prison, which reminded him a little too much of the Kisaragi brat. "GAAAH! I am _so_ pissed! They've gotten lucky for the last goddamn time!" He burst out of the ice with sheer strength and stalked through a Dark Corridor back to Midnight Town.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Back in the Hub..._

"..." Roxas was dead quiet for almost a whole minute, looking between Hazama and the girls, all of whom had the same sort of _I still can't believe it, and I was there,_ expression. Lambda, however, wore a confident grin. At length, Roxas sighed. "I suppose that's that, then. Welcome to the team, Hazama. Now that that's settled, there are a few things you should all know about the rest of the tests."

Roxas pointed at the next door in line, which had the label:

 _Training World 3:_

 _Spring Falls_

He explained, "As you can see, the next Training World is open." He pulled out another notecard. "Wisdom from the mouth of the Great Wizard Merlin: He has taken your comments about lack of originality in Midnight Town to heart and sent a poll to the Radiant Garden Restoration Committee and Disney Castle for world ideas. This one was Chip and Dale's submission, and it's a little...off the wall. Don't let the nice-sounding name fool you - this might be the weirdest world you'll ever enter. Still, King Mickey claims it's not without precedent. But before that, you might want to backtrack a bit."

Roxas pointed at the door to Midnight Town, which now read:

 _Training World 1:_

 _RE: Midnight Town_

He flipped to another notecard. "During your first visit to Midnight Town, you probably figured out that it's modeled after a world the Heartless had taken over without finding the Keyhole. There wasn't much there except ruins, right? But after you cleared that world and unlocked the Practice Keyhole, Merlin replaced it with a repaired version of the town. The restored Midnight Town has all the stuff you'd expect to find in a big town. You can spend the TP you've gained so far at shops, rest at inns, play some games to bet and win TP, and get in some practice on the Heartless that still infest the alleyways. You should check it out before you move on to the next world."

Kairi raised her hand. "Are all the people still generic NPCs with only one line of dialogue each?"

Roxas blinked. "What's an NPC? Well, the people are still the same, Merlin says. Some of them say new things, but don't expect a witty conversation."

Kairi shrugged. "Never mind."

Xion mentioned, "The first time we fought the boss of the last world, Terumi beat it before we could, and then time looped around to when we first entered the world. What was _that_ all about?"

Roxas grinned. "That's Merlin's magic for you! He set it up so if you fail your objectives, the Training World you're in will reset itself to the last time you touched one of those green circles. You know, the ones that heal you and let you return to the hub."

Kairi burst out, "I _knew_ they were save points!"

Xion rolled her eyes and explained for Roxas' benefit. "It turns out Kairi's into video games. She's been going on about how game-like this whole Training Worlds plan is since we first set out into Midnight Town. By the way, after the last world gave us all fake memories, I've been introduced to anime. I'd like to show you a few of the favorite shows 'Ion' remembers after this business with Xehanort gets settled."

Roxas took a moment to take in this information. "...Huh. I guess we'll have a lot of catching up to do. My time in here has been a bit boring, though. I bench-pressed a few thousand pounds, beat up simulated Organization XIII members, and worked on my Observation, but that's about it."

Xion clapped to congratulate him. "A few thousand pounds is 'about it'? That's amazing!"

Lambda told him, "Feats of strength aside, you should really try to perfect your Observation skills. If you get good enough at it, you can basically get a ringside seat to whatever Xion is doing at the moment, so we won't need to do so much recap after each world."

Hazama mock-gasped. "Isn't that a breach of privacy, dignity, integrity, and a bunch of other -ity words?"

Lambda rolled her eyes. "And you'd know all about that, Mr. Captain of NOL Intelligence. It's not like they have a choice...and I've got my eye on you, too."

Xion wondered, "Who says I have anything to hide?"

Hazama shrugged and dropped the subject. "Eh, no big deal."

Roxas got firmly back onto the original topic. " _Anyway,_ about the resetting thing. It'll also happen if one of you dies or gets otherwise defeated. Merlin says this only applies to facets of the Training Worlds and the illusory Heartless he's conjured up, which means it does _not_ apply to Terumi or any other outsiders. Don't let Terumi kill you...obviously. You should try to avoid relying on this feature at all, actually, because real worlds don't let you try again after dying. Oh, and Merlin left a hint that you may end up causing a lot of resets in the next world, but he didn't say why."

 _"How are you getting this information?"_ Namine asked. _"Didn't Merlin send you in here so we wouldn't distort the Training Worlds by sending communications through?"_

Roxas grinned. "Oh, he solved that problem...by sending a huge stack of notecards all at once, with answers to every question you could possibly ask. Just to prove it, the answer to your next question is on this card here." He tossed yet another notecard to Kairi like a ninja shuriken.

Kairi caught the little white paper inches from her nose and read its contents: _Card 26-A: No, your adoptive father back on the Destiny Islands has not entered or tampered with your room during your absence. And no, I am not in touch with every old man in the worlds, just the world-traveling, non-evil ones._ Kairi looked up and said flatly, "Yep, he got me. Twice. Merlin just gets more and more ridiculously powerful the more I hear of him. Remind me why he doesn't just blast Xehanort himself?"

Roxas smirked as he replied, "The answer is on Card 26-B." He tossed another card, which Kairi opened. Everyone else crowded around her as she read it.

 _Card 26-B: Because my magical mastery extends to everything_ except _combat. That is what you all have Keyblades for. Unlike Yen Sid, I did not split my focus between the two disciplines, but specialized in weaving the fabric of the arcane to..._ The card ran out of space before Merlin's rant could really gather steam.

Kairi nodded sagely. "Well, that clears that up. So, I guess we ought to go shopping now."

Roxas tossed her yet another notecard, then waved goodbye. "Have fun, then. That's an explanation of how TP is tracked. I probably should have given you that one earlier."

"Well, at least you remembered before we needed to spend any. See you in a bit!"

"Hold on," Hazama held up a hand. "Did Merlin send you any technical manuals, spell tomes, history textbooks, that sort of thing? Could be important. After all, gathering information was half of my job back in the Azure Timeline."

Roxas shuddered. "Oh, yeah. Way too many for me to ever read them all. The girls were supposed to buy copies of whatever they wanted to read at the bookstore in Midnight Town. Come to think of it, Hazama, I'm not sure you can even rack up TP like the others. Even Merlin wouldn't have predicted you joining the team, but he is still watching, so maybe he set it up already."

Xion pulled open the door to Midnight Town. "Let's find out, then."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _RE: Midnight Town: Town Square..._

The first thing the group noticed upon returning to Midnight Town was the noise. Generic brown-haired people chatted with each other, creating indistinct white noise, as they wandered up and down the sides of wide streets leading in the cardinal directions, while others drove cars and trucks that revved their engines in time with the flow of traffic and occasionally beeped their horns at each other. The girls stood in the middle of a circle formed by the roads skirting around a grassy lawn marked by a large, silvery statue of a crescent moon. At the square base of the statue was inscribed, "In Memory of Old Midnight Town."

Namine remarked. _"That's an interesting monument. The residents of most worlds wouldn't remember its destruction, but this world wasn't destroyed completely, so the people had to rebuild. Perhaps we should mention it to the Radiant Garden Restoration Committee so they can do something similar for the old Radiant Garden and Hollow Bastion."_

Hazama pointed at the cars. "The cars roll on wheels? And they're burning some kind of fuel, judging by the smoke. How inefficient; you'd think they'd have flying Magitek cars by now."

"There was a wrecked truck on the streets in The World That Never Was," Xion mentioned, "but only one, and no one in the Organization knew how it got there. No one cared enough to solve that mystery...of course. Still, it must be easier to drive a car than to walk all the way across Midnight Town. I wonder if there are any other options, like the public skateboards like they have in Twilight Town."

"It doesn't matter much if we can't buy anything when we get where we're going," Lambda pointed out. "Kairi, what does that card say?"

Kairi opened the notecard, which unfolded to five times its original length. After reading it, she summarized the TP system for everyone. "Okay, so each Heartless type gives everyone a set amount of TP that goes into a shared pool that can be spent on food, books, and common items, but there's also Bonus Training Points for performing new and/or impressive feats, and the Bonus TP score for each of us is tracked individually. Bonus TP is used to buy unique and powerful items to suit our personal styles. We can check our TP by pressing the big gold button at any store, or buy a TP Tracker at an appliance store."

Xion mused, "Good to know. Now we just have to find a store and get there through traffic." She was then struck by an idea and summoned her Sonic Blade to fly over the traffic. "I mean, I can just fly there, but the rest of you might have some trouble."

"What was that?" Hazama called from above the north road, where he was using Ouroboros to cling to a building. "Couldn't hear you from way back there!"

"It's a simple matter of figuring out the rules and following them." Kairi rolled her eyes as she crossed the street when a traffic light on the other side lit up green. The cars stopped moving, allowing her to pass. Lambda followed behind her. "We don't really have to stick together right now. Let's meet up at the Hub when we're done exploring. Just keep an eye out for Terumi!"

"Well, then, I'll see you girls later. Abominations to find, NPC reactions to experiment with, you know how it goes." Hazama kicked off the wall and fired Ouroboros repeatedly to swing away from the group like Tarzan on a vine. Xion flew in the same general direction, but not before changing her T-shirt's slogan to say, _"Why Walk When I'm This Fly?"_

"Is Hazama heading off to torture random citizens?" Lambda wondered.

Kairi shrugged. "That, or try and glitch their AIs by blocking their path, asking weird questions, putting a bucket on their heads, sticking them to a wall with his chain, things like that. It's part of the fun of big, sandbox-style games...if you're okay with cruelty to random strangers. There's no point worrying too much about the NPCs, though. Besides, you could just do that Observation trick you mentioned to Roxas and find out what he's doing in a heartbeat."

Lambda nodded. "Good idea. And maybe I can... Target located. I found Terumi. He's ripping up Heartless and snarling, but he's nowhere near any of us...and it looks like Xion got lost. Anyway, I think I'll stick with you. Lead on, wise shopping expert!"

Kairi giggled. "No complaints here; you're the one with the map, after all, although I'm pretty sure I could find my way around. It looks like Hazama and Xion went the wrong way, though."

Lambda blinked. "How can you tell?"

"The signs, silly!" Kairi pointed at the traffic light next to them. A sign sticking out of the pole sideways read, _North Street: MoogleCorp HQ, City Hall_. Then she pointed to the right, at a sign that read, _East Street: Shopping District._ "We're going that way."

Lambda facepalmed. "Oh. Duh." Checking the other signs, she reported, "Map data updated. I kind of want to check out the Entertainment District down West Street, and the Arena Pillar down South Street sounds important."

"Let's come back to explore those after finishing Training World 3," Kairi suggested. "Right now, I've got an unknown amount of TP burning a hole in my pocket."

"What pocket?" Lambda joked as they headed down East Street.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _East Street: The Food Room..._

About twenty minutes of walking later, Lambda and Kairi came upon an oddly-named restaurant and froze when both their stomachs growled at the same time and pitch. They looked at each other sheepishly and came to an unspoken agreement to take a lunch break.

Inside the building was a typical fast-food restaurant setup, with a generic NPC behind the counter, a sign detailing the restaurant's menu over that, and several round tables scattered throughout the eating area with a box of napkins on each one. The NPC, dressed in what appeared at first to be a butler outfit - on closer inspection, it turned out to be a cheap T-Shirt and shorts with a design printed on them - greeted them, "Welcome to The Food Room, madams! Are you ready to order?"

Kairi replied, "Not yet, we need to check our money."

"Certainly, madam. Please take your time."

Lambda looked around and spotted a kiosk near the door. It consisted of a white-framed screen mounted on a metal stand at eye level, with a very simple control panel just under that. There was only one button: a big, gold circle marked "CHECK". Lambda walked up and pushed the button, and the screen came to life:

 _Shared TP: 2600_

 _Lambda's Bonus TP: 450_

"Neat; very user-friendly! It looks like we can't view each other's Bonus TP, though." Lambda glanced at the menu sign; the most expensive thing on the menu, "Royalberry Ice Cream," only cost 30 TP; no worries there.

Kairi checked her own score, which gave an interesting result:

 _Shared TP: 2600_

 _Kairi's Bonus TP: 700_

 _Namine's Bonus TP: 750_

Namine materialized and pointed at the third line, asking, "Why do I have a score, too?"

Kairi gave her a kind smile. "You certainly deserve it; you've been really helpful! You helped Lambda get started with magic, you fixed my memories in Lotus Academy, and I noticed you've been keeping an eye out for enemies sneaking up behind us ever since we all fought Xemnas' dragon-mecha-thing. It's only fair that you get a reward for your support."

Namine nodded thoughtfully, then vanished. _"That makes sense. I don't know what kind of bonus item would be helpful to me in this form, though."_

"I guess we'll find out on this shopping trip," Lambda replied as she approached the NPC again. After a quick glance at the menu, she told him, "I'd like a medium-size, plain burger and a large pretzel, please. Oh, and a small Rocket Soda to drink."

"Certainly. And for you, madam?"

Kairi said, "I'd like a medium burger with everything on it, and I'd like to try these 'French fries' instead of the pretzel, in the smallest size you have, please. I'll just have a small glass of water to drink."

The NPC said again, "Certainly. And for you, madam?"

A startled Namine asked, _"You're asking me...? Well, I don't really eat. I'll just share the sensations from Kairi."_

Without missing a beat, the NPC replied, "Certainly. Your total is 25 TP; please pick up your food at the end of the counter when it's ready. Enjoy your meal." Of course, since the whole restaurant was an illusion, the food was ready instantly. It appeared in a puff of sparkles, already neatly arranged on a tray.

Lambda took the food to the closest table and set it out for herself and Kairi. Between bites, she mumbled, "So this is what burgers taste like when they're cooked right!"

Kairi rolled her eyes as she wiped some grease from the fries off of her lips. "Lambda, mind your manners! I agree that it's really good, though! As for the fries, they're really greasy, but delicious, and they're just the right size to pop in your mouth! What's the 'French' part, though? As far as I can tell, they're just sliced potatoes fried in grease."

Lambda explained what she knew. "France was a country that was mostly destroyed and covered in seithr by the Black Beast in the Azure Timeline. I'm not sure how Merlin would know about it, since the old name of the country is barely mentioned even in history books nowadays...and it was in the other timeline. Come to think of it, how do _I_ know about it? I hardly think obscure history trivia like that would be necessary to download into a Murakumo Unit."

Namine theorized, _"Maybe it's the work of that 'voice' that tells you and Kairi the names of places and monsters. I still don't know why you two can hear this voice and I can't."_

"Maybe," Lambda agreed as she finished her soda (as for her pretzel, it was gone almost immediately). "I really want to figure out what that's all about. All in good time, I guess. We have a long to-do list before we can look into that mystery."

"Right." Kairi wiped her mouth on a napkin and stood up. The bags and cups disappeared in a magic poof. "First, let's check out some actual shops!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Xion's perspective] North Street: Northwest Quadrant..._

Meanwhile, Xion had promptly gotten lost by ducking into a side alley. Flying over the rooftops let her see that there was a big domed building at the north end of the city, next to a skyscraper with a sign on the side that read _MoogleCorp_ (The "O" in "Corp" was replaced with a red ball which probably represented a Moogle's pom pom). There didn't seem to be any shops on the way there, however.

Rather than go back to get teased by Lambda right away, Xion decided to get some more training against the Heartless. She ducked into one of the many dark alleyways leading away from the main roads, knowing she could just fly up and find the Town Square to leave the world when she was done.

It wasn't long before a random gaggle of Soldiers appeared. Xion summoned Ouroboros to deal with them, and it suddenly occurred to her that Hazama and Terumi's chain had the same name as her jaw-sword. Jumping into battle with a chuckle, she mused, "I wonder if Hazama found anything interesting?"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Hazama's perspective] East Street: Good to Know..._

Contrary to his apparently directionless swinging, Hazama had quickly charted a shortcut between North Street and East Street to return to his original stated objective of finding a book to read, which was how he ended up in a bookstore just a little further down the road from The Food Room. Poking the kiosk at the entrance just made it give him an _ERROR_ message, but Hazama didn't care.

He found a few neat-looking books, like _Magic Allocation For Dummies_ , a yellow pamphlet which contained instructions for compartmentalizing one's mana to prepare a set, or "deck", of spells and magic-boosted attacks that would recharge individually; _There Goes a Keyblade Glider_ , which appeared to be a book for toddlers but would clearly be of great interest to the Keyblade-wielding girls, and _The Official Prima_ _'Kingdom Hearts'_ _Strategy Guide_ , a strangely-titled paperback book which seemed to contain a comprehensive breakdown of everything that happened to Sora a year ago.

Rather than pay for the books, he tricked the NPC shopkeeper by hiding behind a shelf and throwing his voice to the far corner of the store - just one of several useful tricks he'd picked up over many centuries of time loops. _"Hello, can I get some help over here?"_ When the shopkeeper turned to look in the direction of the voice, Hazama slipped out of the store undetected, snickering to himself as the door shut. "NOL Intelligence expert versus idiot NPC? No contest." He settled onto one of the benches that lined the street at regular intervals and started reading.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Lambda's perspective] East Street: Seers..._

Lambda and Kairi next visited a confusingly-named appliance store to pick up the "TP Tracker" that was mentioned in the notecard, and anything else that caught their eyes. The store's layout was as high-tech as their products; next to the TP kiosk were a line of similar kiosks, each with a touchscreen on the control panel and a round, black pad on the ground connected to the stand.

Lambda stepped up to one of the kiosks and touched the panel, causing a list of products to pop up. She paged through categories like Kitchenware, Washing Machines, and Furniture until she reached a promising category: Adventuring Essentials.

Touching that button brought up a bunch of wearable electronics like fitness trackers and smartwatches. Lambda figured her own internal functions were already superior to most of these gadgets, but a couple stood out: the "TP Tracker" she was looking for, and a "MoogleCorp Mobile Shopping Terminal". Ultimately, though, she decided to just get the TP Tracker, which cost a full 1000 TP. Since she and Kairi were the only ones spending points today, Lambda figured it was okay to spend that much. She pushed the "Buy Now" button, selected "Yes"...selected "Yes, Really"...selected "Shut up and take my TP"...checked the box labeled "Only confirm purchases once", and finally selected "Confirm Purchase".

A small cardboard box was teleported onto the pad next to the kiosk. Lambda griped, "That was annoying. Who would design a system like that?"

 _"Probably an old wizard with a personal grudge against computers and anyone who uses them,"_ Namine replied dryly.

Lambda nodded in agreement. "Yeah, that makes sense. It's still annoying, though."

Meanwhile, Kairi was at the next kiosk over, looking at the Unique Items category, which only showed the items specifically designed for Namine and herself. There was only one item in this store's inventory: "Memory Flasher". The product picture showed a metal cylinder with a lens on the side and a red button on the bottom. Kairi touched an arrow and brought up a description: "This device channels and focuses Namine's powers. Simply point the lens at a person and press the button, and a flash of light will scramble the victim's short-term memory, leaving them in a trance-like state for a few seconds. During this time, Namine can implant complex memories into the victim with much lower risk. _Caution: do not look directly into the lens. Keep the device pointed away from other people when not in use. Do not use repeatedly on the same person within a one minute period; permanent brain damage may occur._ "

Namine read the description, re-read it, and re-read it again. _"This is..."_

Kairi finished, "...Kind of evil, isn't it?"

Namine tried to find an alternate use for a handheld amnesia inducer. _"But it would certainly be useful if you ever get kidnapped again, right? We could just flash the bad guys and walk away."_

"Why did you have to bring that up? Not that it matters." Kairi pointed out the price tag: _2000 Bonus TP (Namine)_. "You might have enough Bonus TP after finishing a few more Training Worlds, if you actually want that thing."

Lambda unboxed her new TP Tracker, which was a tiny touchscreen that came with a strap to be worn like a watch. "What do you think, Kairi? Stylish and futuristic, or ugly and trying too hard?"

"Definitely the second one." Kairi took the TP Tracker and stuffed it in her hip pouch. "What we really need is one of those Bags of Holding."

 _"Maybe we could find one at another store. I saw a place called Ms. Wardrobe's Wardrobe across the street."_

The girls left Seers and looked across the street. Kairi caught sight of a quaint little shop peeking over the traffic. "Nicely spotted, Namine! Let's check it out."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Later..._

Kairi ended up spending a lot of TP on a Ribbon that claimed to resist all magic elements, but they did manage to buy four Pouches of Holding that looked just like Kairi's current hip pouch, but with color-coded ribbons: pink for Kairi, green for Lambda, blue for Xion, and black for Hazama.

"Can you imagine Hazama wearing this girly pouch?" Lambda mentioned as they left the store. She tied her new pouch's strap around her waist and cinched it up. "It looks pretty good on me, at least."

Kairi giggled at the mental image. "Oops, I hadn't thought of that! I suppose we could give it to him anyway..." She transferred her promise charm and the rest of her stuff from her old pouch to the new one, including the old pouch itself. "Ready to head back and tackle the next Training World, Lambda?"

Lambda nodded and set off toward the west. "Yeah. The save point's back this way."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Xion's perspective] The Training Worlds: Hub..._

Xion returned to the Hub first, satisfied at having figured out how to target specific enemies with the many homing shots of Ragnarok. She'd figured out how to either concentrate all the shots on one target, or spread them out evenly so each bullet would seek a different enemy. Of course, the second way would only work if she faced a large enough group. Xion was sure she could refine the technique further, but fighting only Shadows and Soldiers got boring after a while, especially on her own.

She had just resigned herself to being bored for a while when Terumi showed up on the warp point, already licking one of his knives. "Y'know, I've been going at this all wrong. You 'power of friendship' types are so much easier to crush when you're alone!" He launched Ouroboros right at Xion's face.

"Eek!" Xion fell prone to dodge the chain, wary that Terumi might use it to launch himself forward, but it seemed that was mostly Hazama's way of using it. She summoned her ScimitArs and shoved herself up to the ceiling, then came down on Terumi's head with all four swords...

...Only to have Terumi vanish and appear behind her. "Venom...Bite!" Xion was suddenly entangled in Ouroboros and blasted by Terumi's slimy, green magic. The sheer power left her panting on her knees. "Hurts, doesn't it? Too bad there's no random bullshit here to save you!"

 _"Think again!"_ Roxas launched out of the Observer Training door Keyblades first, azure eyes blazing, and while Terumi managed to sidestep the rush due to the forewarning shout, he was caught by the pillars of Light that accompanied Roxas' every motion whenever he fought seriously. "Faith!" Roxas raised Oblivion over his head and conjured Light pillars in a circle around himself, which then swirled away from him throughout the whole room. Terumi hissed as the Light burned him, but Xion's wounds were healed. "I've been called a lot of things, but 'random bullshit' is a new one."

Terumi set Ouroboros spinning around himself threateningly...but defensively. "Shit shit shit! You're just the brat I kicked out of the way on my way in! Where do you get off being the big damn hero here? How did you get so much power?!"

Roxas smirked. "Sit-up, push-ups, and plenty of juice. Oh, and fighting three Organization members at a time. It really helps teach you..." Oathkeeper flew into position on its own to block Ouroboros, which launched out of a portal from the side of the room, "...how to deal with sneak attacks from multiple directions. While I was doing all this training, I finally figured out that Observation trick to see what Xion's doing. So I saw her getting attacked in the Hub, and here I am."

"Dammit! Gleaming Fang!" Terumi rushed forward at full speed, covered in slimy magic, hoping to overwhelm Roxas' defense, but he was caught up in the swirl of Light as Roxas sent his Keyblades spinning around himself like Sora's Vicinity Break move on steroids. Terumi was ripped up and blasted away.

"Feel free to slither away and save your skin any time now. I still have even more power to burn," Roxas taunted.

"Shit... I need more power! More hate!" Terumi seemed to turn into a silhouette that burst into green flames and vanished.

Roxas shrugged and turned away from where Terumi had disappeared. "Hate yourself, Terumi."

Where Terumi failed to catch him off guard, Xion totally blindsided him, glomping him with tears of relief shining in her emerald eyes. "Roxas, thank you so much! I thought I was going to die there!"

Roxas returned the embrace. "It's okay. I'm here for you. Honestly, though, I was hoping he'd try something like this; I was about to die of boredom."

"But what if he attacks in the Training Worlds? Could you get there in time?"

"I...I don't know. But there must be a way to handle him if you all work together. You all have your own specializations, and you're still getting stronger and finding new powers. Have faith, Xion."

"I will!" She kissed his cheek and pulled him down to sit with her as they waited for the others to return.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A few minutes later..._

Lambda and Kairi finally returned. "We're back! Bags of Holding and chocolates for everyone!"

Xion accepted the pouch with the blue ribbon and tied it around to her jean shorts as a belt. "You missed the fireworks, you two. Terumi was here."

"He what?! He didn't hurt you, did he?"

Xion bounced around and made swooping hand gestures as she recounted the battle. "He did, but then Roxas came barreling out that door and wiped the floor with him! It was like _this_ and _this_ and KAPOW! Between his floating Keyblades, Light element, and that Faith spell of his, Terumi didn't stand a chance. He got away, though, and we'll still have to worry about him when we're deep in one of the Training Worlds." She didn't even notice when Hazama appeared and started snickering at her antics.

"Yeah, it was pretty cool," Roxas agreed. "I've been training."

Lambda frowned. "More like _we've_ been slacking. I've spent so long playing catch-up...am I ever going to be of any use?"

"Sounds to me like you're focusing on the wrong training," Hazama pointed out. "You hacked that Gundam like _that,_ after all." He snapped his fingers for emphasis. "You could probably get some mileage out of your Drive, as well."

"Drive?" Kairi parroted.

Lambda blinked; she hadn't thought of that. She explained for Kairi's sake, "A Drive is a special power expressed by a person's soul. Generally, if a person breathes in enough seithr and doesn't die of poison, they unlock their Drive, although using it comes with its own risks of corruption. Grimoires for Ars Magus each have a built-in Drive as well. For example, my old Murakumo had the drive "Sword Summoner," which became "Sword Summoner EX" when I got the IDEA Engine. You've seen me shooting energy swords around, right?"

Kairi nodded. "Right, although they didn't seem to do much damage."

Lambda frowned at the memories. "They used to be a serious threat, but Murakumo didn't play nice with the Power of Light, so my weapon kept getting weaker as my personality got stronger. Relius mentioned that my entire soul has been rebuilt piece by piece; I bet my real Drive is entirely different now. It could be anything, but I think I know what to look for."

 _"What is this 'soul' you mentioned?"_ Namine asked.

Lambda scratched her head. "...No one can really define it. I know it's separate from my heart, mind, and body, but entangled with all of them. I think it's where magic comes from in this universe."

"Didn't you say using your Drive without a Grimoire is dangerous?" Xion asked.

"Yes, but I have the IDEA Engine and the Keyblade, and most abilities from the Azure Timeline function a bit differently here anyway; I'm sure it'll work." She wasn't sure _how_ she was sure, but she could feel it.

Kairi asked, "So, what _is_ your Drive? Do you even know?"

"I don't know, but a Drive is supposed to reflect one's personality and desires. And I know what I desire most: options." There! That word resonated deep within Lambda. She found it!

She summoned her Keyblade and held it over her head. "Option!" A white flash occurred at the tip of Elysium, and a construct of solid energy appeared. It had the size and shape of a chicken egg, with three triangular fins fanned out around the wide end that made it look like a futuristic attack drone. Adding to this impression was the round opening on the front; at Lambda's mental command, the Option fired a white energy bolt at a certain point on the wall, then a continuous stream of rapid shots.

"Whoa, cool!" Xion gave it a thumbs-up.

"Not much more useful than a normal Fire spell, though," Hazama pointed out.

"There's more to it." Lambda visualized a new design for the Option. "Fire!" Rather than launch a fireball, the spell transformed the Option into a new form, which now resembled a plastic model of a fireball streaking forward. It sprayed a stream of flames into the air. "Cure!" The Option changed shape again, becoming a green torus with white flower markings on it. It hovered over Kairi's head and shined a green light on her that would constantly regenerate her wounds. "It looks like I can make as many different Options as I can come up with designs for."

Hazama pushed, "How many Options can you make at once?"

"Option!" At first, making a new Option caused the old one to disappear, but Lambda soon got the hang of keeping two active at once, and she could transform them and control them separately. "Nngh...I'm sure if I train with this, I can make more. It's going to take some practice to get used to controlling more than one Option in combat, too."

Hazama pointed at the door to _Spring Falls_. "Well then, what are you waiting for? The Training Worlds await."

"Yeah. Thanks for the push, Hazama!"

Hazama smirked. "Glad to be of service. Really, though, you were pathetic up until now."

"That ends today." Lambda pushed open the door to the next Training World...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: I was going to go right to the next world (for which I have an awesome gimmick lined up) but I mentioned in PMs to some of you that there would be stuff to do back in Midnight Town, so I felt like I should show that first, and then this took so LONG that I just wanted to post something._


	8. Dreams of Falling

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 8: Dreams of Falling**

 **-"Be Careful Out There."-**

 _A/N: Sorry for the extra-long wait. More_ Xenoblade _updates_ , Hyrule Warriors _being released again,_ _and just plain procrastination are to blame._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Spring Falls: Area 1-1..._

After entering the new Training World, Lambda had just one thing to say. "What the _hell_ am I looking at?!"

Xion replied, "I think that's...us? It all looks...flat, though."

"But if that's us over there," Kairi wondered, "then who are we out here?"

Hazama chuckled, "Well, if I signed on for new experiences, I guess I got 'em."

The new world wasn't much to look at: just a grassy block of dirt that stretched as far as they could see to the left and right. What had the trainees' attention was _how_ they were looking at it; like an out-of body experience, each of them saw the same view from a short distance away. Their own bodies were standing on the platform, and they could move themselves normally and feel things they touched, but their senses of sight, hearing, and smell were all from this third-person view, and there was no depth to that view at all. The partly cloudy sky behind the platform seemed like wallpaper. For each of the explorers, the others' voices seemed to come from off to the side somewhere, but nothing they tried could change their view to see anything else. At least, not until Kairi stepped forward a few paces, which moved the viewpoint to follow her while keeping the rest of the group in sight. "Ha! I thought so!"

Lambda asked, "Kairi? Do you know what's going on?"

Kairi replied succinctly, "Two words: action platformer."

Still confused, Xion asked her to, "Explain, please?"

Namine replied, _"She means this is even more like a video game than usual."_ As soon as she started speaking, though, she made everyone jump in surprise as a translucent, yellow-orange hologram appeared along the bottom of the "screen" - overlapping everyone's view of the platform - which filled in with the words she was saying. On the left side of the text box was a picture of Namine from the shoulders up, wearing a neutral expression. The picture shifted to a concerned expression when she said what everyone was thinking: _"What...? Everything else about this world is weird, but_ this _is crazy!"_ One second after she finished talking, the text box shortened to nothing and disappeared.

Kairi shrugged. "I guess you're our mission control, Namine. I hope the text box doesn't distract us from platforming."

"But what _is_ platforming?" asked an exasperated Lambda. This world's crazy setup rubbed her the wrong way, sort of like her experiences in Wonderland.

Kairi explained for the benefit of the non-gamers in the party, "We'll have to make our way to the right by jumping on these platforms, while trying not to fall in the bottomless pit below us, and probably fighting enemies along the way. Then there'll be a boss at the end, and we'll be done."

Xion arched an eyebrow. "I find it hard to believe that the pit under this platform is bottomless. Where does the gravity come from?"

Kairi allowed, "Well, interpretations vary. There might be ground of some sort down there, but it would be way too far down to survive the fall. Regardless, if you fall in the pit, either you lose an extra life, or it's Game Over."

Hazama noted, "This must be what Roxas meant when he said we might cause a lot of resets in this world. So, girls, how good are you at jumping? In my case, I have an Ars for that." He hopped into the air and demonstrated his basic double jump and air dash Ars Magus tricks. These Ars came bundled with every combat Grimoire ever created, along with a limited Barrier and an emergency Burst, because who would want to do without those basics in a fight if they had the choice?

Lambda hesitantly replied, "I... _used_ to have an Ars for that." She tried it, and it...well, it didn't work. She got almost a foot off the ground. "Drat. My jump is pathetic."

"It's still better than mine," Kairi replied.

Namine added, _"My jump is the same as Kairi's, although it's not really relevant right now."_

"Well, I'm set to go." Xion effortlessly jumped twice her own height, did three Air Slides, and then used a Glide to reach the edge of the camera's range, cramming the others on the left side as she inspected the first bottomless pit they'd have to clear. "The Organization's agility training was brutal. They said it was to help us compensate for the fact that Nobodies are generally bad at blocking. I'm not sure I can give you two any pointers, though."

Refusing to let Xion stay ahead of her forever, Lambda scanned her. "Scanning...analyzing...that's neat, it looks like you're using magic for mobility! Come to think of it, I bet I could mimic the Ars I used to use with a magic effect...maybe I should fuel it with the Power of Light, to keep my mana free for spellcasting. Simulating...confirmed. Designing custom effect...done." Lambda jumped again, and this time managed to match Hazama's performance.

"What should I do, then?" Kairi asked. "At this rate, I'll be left behind again."

Lambda smiled at her. "Namine, please do that thing where you copied Sora's knowledge of the Fire spell into me."

 _"Yes, that should work."_ Namine's picture disappeared from the text box, which then displayed, _"Copying data...done! Save changes?_ Yes **/** No? _Saving...done!"_ Namine's picture appeared again. _"Why did it...I just want you all to know that using my power doesn't feel like copying files at all. But I think it worked."_

"How in the worlds would you know what copying files 'feels' like?" Lambda asked.

Namine's picture looked down and frowned with the same somber expression she'd worn most of the time while working with DiZ. _"From reading your memories, actually. I've been passing the time by reading everyone's memories I can reach, which is almost everyone in the worlds except Hazama, since he still isn't connected to Sora directly. I'm sorry I didn't tell you all."_

Lambda replied, "Makes sense. I suppose it's good that you told us before it became important. Please at least mention it next time you want to poke around my memories, okay?"

Xion's view on the matter was, "I would be more surprised if you had managed to avoid seeing all my memories, after all the work you needed to do on Sora."

Kairi added, "You needed to fix my memories in Lotus Academy, too. Besides, I'm already trusting you to share space in my own heart. It would be kind of silly to try and keep that part of my heart off-limits."

Hazama smirked. "Unlike the rest of you, I am very glad I'm immune! Not that anyone asked. Besides, if you tried to poke around in my memories, either you'd be stuck doing that for years while trying to read them all, or you'd go insane right away."

Namine's picture shifted to a teary smile. _"Thank you all for trusting me. And thanks for the warning, Hazama."_

Kairi put on her best Sora grin. "It's no big deal. But that means we're all set to go platforming, right?" She ran to the front of the group and jumped over the pit...only to fall just short of the edge and drop offscreen.

 _*KZZZT*_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Mission failed. Try again._

After the reset, Kairi sheepishly rubbed her neck. "Oops. I can make it with an air dash, though!" She ran at the ledge again, and this time she managed to clear the gap.

"Whoa!" Lambda yelped as she and the other trainees were shunted along with the edge of the "camera", almost falling in the pit. "I guess the view follows whoever is in front, and the rest of us can't go out of sight." She jumped over the pit and waved for the others to follow.

"Except if we fall in the pit, obviously," Hazama reminded them as he touched down. "Try not to fall in again until we find a save point, hmm?"

Xion stuck the landing after three Air Slides. "Yeah, that would be a pain."

Kairi nodded as they approached a new obstacle: three lines of tiny platforms that slowly moved up and down in alternating columns, forming a conveyor of sorts to carry unwary jumpers offscreen if they took too long. Kairi watched the pattern carefully. "Whoa, that's quite a difficulty spike! ...Okay, I think I've got it. Follow my lead, everyone."

Kairi jumped on the first platform, rode it down until the next one was in reach, rode that one up nearly to the top of the screen, jumped to the last column, and quickly jumped off it to reach the solid ground on the other side before she could be carried too low.

Hazama grinned. "I've got a better idea." He waited for a specific opening and launched Ouroboros, threading it between two of the platform columns. Before the opening moved on, the chain latched onto thin air and yanked Hazama forward, letting him sail over the last column to safety. "It's safe to say that having a swinging tool in this situation is pretty much the coolest thing ever."

Xion clapped. "Neat! Let me get over there real quick." She High Jumped straight up to the top of the screen and made it across with one Glide.

Lambda used Kairi's route to follow. "Gliding just _has_ to be cheating somehow," she grumbled.

Xion shrugged. "Oh, that's nothing. I would have used Sonic Blade to fly across, but I'm being blocked from summoning that specific weapon. I guess I can blame Merlin's foresight."

That got Hazama's attention. "Speaking of other weapons, I got a book about transforming the Keyblade into everything from a space-traveling Glider to Dual Yo-Yos while we were back in Midnight Town. Who wants to read it first?"

Lambda quickly replied, "I call dibs!"

Hazama withdrew the tiny, cardboard-paged book from one of his jacket's many hidden pockets and threw it at Lambda, who caught it and placed it in her new Bag of Holding for now. "Annnd _sold,_ to the blonde girl in the green dress!"

"You're going to have to wait to read it until we get out of this third-person view," Kairi pointed out as she started walking forward again. "And it looks like we have company to deal with first."

The platform they were currently on was larger than the screen, leaving plenty of room for five Shadows and two Tornado Steps to share the platform with the trainees. Everyone readied their weapons and joined the fight...except Hazama, who pulled himself up to the top of the screen and hung there to watch. "I wouldn't want to hog all the foes to myself, now would I?"

"No problem." Xion repelled a spinning tackle from a Tornado Step with her Keyblade, causing both fighters to rebound from each other, then spun her blade with that momentum into a lunging stab that took the Heartless out.

Kairi air-dashed over Xion's head and came down with a leaping slash to take out the Tornado Step in the back of the enemy group.

However, Kairi and her look-alike had neglected to pay attention to the weaker Shadows, which pulled themselves flat to the ground like they usually did...but from this perspective, that trick made them completely invisible, allowing one to surprise Xion from behind.

"Option!" Lambda caught the little Heartless with a lunging stab before it could deliver a sneak attack. She summoned a basic Option drone on the tip of her Keyblade, _while_ it was inside the Shadow. The hapless Heartless exploded from the inside, and the newly-created Option zipped around to catch each of the other Shadows right as they surfaced. "Elimination of targets confirmed."

"Thanks for the save, Lambda." Xion dismissed her Keyblade. "That was sloppy of me."

"Any time. I was wondering when I would get to save you for a change!"

At the far side of the platform, Kairi noticed, "Hey, shouldn't the camera have moved to the right more than this? Maybe this is the edge of the map..." She hesitantly walked out of sight, causing everything to go black for a moment.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Area 1-2..._

"GREAT BOUNCING BULLY DOGS I'M BLIND! ...Oh wait, we're fine now." Xion stopped randomly waving her arms as the screen faded back into view.

Lambda facepalmed. "Seriously, Xion, you need to chill out a little. Remember that everyone's ears are right next to you."

Kairi ventured forward. "It looks like we've made it to a new area. I wonder what new challenges will be in our way?" The only real difference they could see from here was that the sky behind them was now a brilliant red-orange sunset.

Lambda warned everyone, "Proximity alert. Heartless inbound. Type confirmed: multiple _Rapid Thrusters_. Unable to determine total number of enemies." Just as she said, several of the bee-like Heartless came spinning onscreen from somewhere up ahead, steadily flying at random elevations and making no effort to turn toward the trainees. Lambda watched them all fly harmlessly overhead.

As the first few went out of sight to the left, more came in from the right at different heights, including one at floor height. Kairi jumped over it, but Xion smashed it with her Keyblade. "They're just going to keep coming, aren't they? What a pain."

Hazama shrugged. "Eh, we needed some way to spice this up. Now that the novelty's wearing off a bit, this world seems too easy." He used Ouroboros to pull himself to the front of the group, revealing the next challenge: "Well, this is a pickle. I said 'spice', not 'spikes!'" The next gap was fairly small, but both edges of the platform on the other side had sharp-looking metal spikes growing out of the ground, leaving only a small area in the center of the platform to make a safe landing.

Kairi wasn't surprised to see the new hazard. She made an air-dash to the safe spot. "The question is, will those just hurt us if we land on them, or will they force the world to reset like an instant death trap?"

Lambda carefully aimed her jump and double-jump to avoid the spikes. "Let's not find out; we can't afford either of those outcomes."

Xion disengaged a Glide and fell straight down when she was over the correct part of the platform. "I know I don't want any spikes stabbed through my shoes!"

"See you on the other side!" Hazama launched Ouroboros diagonally and swung all the way over the platform, pulling the camera forward to reveal a scattering of smaller platforms, some of which were completely covered in spikes. He landed on one of the closer platforms, then skipped an unsafe platform to reach the middle. "C'mon, are you girls so scared that you have to stop and catch your breath after every obstacle?"

Xion jumped and did an Air Slide to speed up her Glide. "You take that back!"

"You'll have to catch me first!" Hazama grinned and led Xion on a chase over the hazardous terrain.

"Hey, you two, wait up for us!" Lambda yelped as the camera nearly dragged her into the first platform's spikes. She and Kairi, with their comparatively lower mobility, were forced to hop from platform to platform almost too quickly to think through their moves or dodge the spikes, let alone the Rapid Thrusters, which were harder to avoid when the platforms the girls needed to land on were all at different elevations. They were forced to cut a few of them in midair to clear a path.

Eventually, they made it to another large, safe platform, where Xion poked Hazama's shoulder. "Caught you!"

Hazama dramatically pressed the back of his gloved hand to his face. "Oh, I am slain!"

Lambda huffed, "That...was more stressful...than jumping across the buildings to reach Xemnas!"

Kairi agreed, "I can't believe we made it...but we did! Hooray for us!"

 _"Congratulations! Let's show the bitch what she's won!"_

Terumi sauntered onscreen from the right. "Oh, isn't that grand? It looks like you've won a painful death!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Defeat Terumi!_

Lambda defended, "Take that back! Kairi is the least deserving person I know of that insult. Besides, 'bitch' is so overused. Don't you have anything original?"

Terumi growled, "Really? That's your response? Guess I'd better remind you how terrifying I can be!"

Xion jumped to the middle of the platform and summoned Forget-Me-Not. "Terumi, I demand a rematch! Leave my friends out of this!"

Terumi raised an eyebrow, but obligingly pulled out his knives. "Really? Well, that's fine. You're just making it easier for me."

Kairi cried out, "Xion, what are you doing?! He just beat you two rooms ago!"

Xion winked at her. "I know something he doesn't know~! Just watch for now; don't jump in too soon."

Lambda blinked. "Huh? Just...don't die, okay? You won't get to reset."

"That, I can promise." Xion leaped into battle the same way she did last time, but when Terumi began spinning a bit of Ouroboros' chain around his hand, she aborted her slash and used an Air Slide to land behind him instead. When Terumi canceled Venom Bite and turned around, he took a Fira in the chest. He shrugged off the weak spell and ran at Xion, leaning way forward and dragging one knife along the ground with a horrible grinding noise. When he reached Xion, he swung into a roundhouse kick, followed by a kick with the other leg, and finished with a swing of the knife he was dragging. While Xion was able to avoid both kicks, the knife cut across her cheek, making her yelp in pain.

"Serpent's Laceration!" Terumi pressed the advantage by sweeping Xion's legs out from under her, then stomping on her face - over, and over, and over again. "Take that! And that! And a few of those! Still feeling cocky?" He finished the combo with a mocking kick to the head.

"C-Cure." The bruises on Xion's face healed and the cut on her cheek closed up, but she still had a nasty headache. Staring up from the ground, she gave Terumi a lopsided grin. "You're going to have to hit harder than that."

"Gladly! Twin Fangs!" Terumi scooped Xion up into the air with his feet and kicked her twice, coating his legs in slimy magic to eat away at her flesh. Then he sent her crashing back to the ground with an axe kick. "Gleaming Fangs!" As she hit the dirt, he crashed down on her with his whole body covered in a snake-like blob of slime, bashing her into the air again. "Serpent's Cursed Sting!" He fused both of his knives into one giant, slime-covered blade, then cleaved into Xion as she fell down again, pressing her up against a green glyph. He stabbed her with two slimy tendrils and pulsed all the power he had left directly into her body. As the glyph disappeared, he kicked her away to land in front of the others. Her body was a mangled heap of wounds that released bits of sparkles and water vapor. "*Huff*...And that's what you get for mocking me, you bitch!"

Xion tried to laugh, but it made her whole body hurt. "*Cough*...Too bad. It looks like...you're all out of power." She was more injured than she'd ever been, but unlike the time she'd died in Twilight Town, her wounds didn't spread any further.

Terumi's jaw dropped. "WHAT?! Why won't you DIE?!"

"Come on...I thought this was something...you knew about...dummy."

Lambda realized what was going on. "The life-link...!"

Terumi hissed. "Seriously?! To who?"

Xion weakly raised a finger. "To... _ouch_...'to whom'. Grammar is important. Ow."

Everyone behind Xion couldn't help but chuckle, despite her serious injuries, but Terumi made a noise like, "ARRRGUHGUR!"

Kairi decided that now was the time to lend a hand, while Terumi was tired and everyone's hatred and fear of him were at a minimum. "Bind!" Terumi's limbs were locked in place. He normally would have been able to escape, but he was physically exhausted and depleted of mana and excess Darkness, having just wasted all of his resources on a target he couldn't kill. "Curaga!" Kairi used up the rest of her mana to heal Xion's wounds completely. "Xion, do you have anything we could use to finish him off?"

"Well, there is one thing..." Xion hopped to her feet, jumped as high as she could, held both hands out to one side, and summoned her Final Weapon. The sword was too big to even lift, much less swing, but when Xion simply dropped it, gravity handled the rest.

*CRASH! _RUMBLE RUMBLE..._ *

Xion landed, eyeing the dust cloud and the floating yellow sparks from her enormous sword's dismissal. "I was hoping you would use that Holy spell instead of healing me right away, but hopefully this worked."

Terumi's voice came from the middle of the cloud. "Ouch...son of a BITCH that hurts!"

Lambda groaned, "Oh, come on! That wasn't enough to kill you?!"

The dust cleared, revealing Terumi from the waist up, with a single, deep cut all the way down the front of his body that exuded green smoke instead of blood. His jacket was in tatters and his hood was down, allowing the girls to see that the upper-left quarter of his face, which seemed to be framed in shadow before, was actually _made_ of shadow, or at least some kind of tar-like evil goop. A flat green spot glowed on his face where his left yellow eye had been.

"I haven't been taking you girls seriously enough...but thankfully, while you need to cheat with a life-link, I'm simply tough enough to take the hit. I'm still going to have to go power up before our next encounter, though, so I can kill you and _kill you_ and KILL YOU ALL until I break your will to fight!"

Kairi yelled at him, "Just get out of here before the dust settles! I do _not_ want to see what's become of your pants!"

"..." Terumi couldn't argue with that, so he vanished in a haze of green flames without saying anything.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Keep going!_

"We did it!" Xion punched the sky.

Hazama approached the group. "Well, color me impressed! You've provided me with yet another reason to stay on the winning team. Real talk, though, who's the other end of the life-link?"

"It's Roxas," Lambda informed him. "Which is why I'm not very worried about Terumi figuring it out. He already had the best opportunity he'll ever get to kill both of them at once, and he wasn't strong enough."

Kairi admonished Xion, "Don't scare me like that! Your plan got you seriously injured!"

"I'd argue that no injury is 'serious' if only one half of the life-link gets hurt," Hazama pointed out.

Kairi wasn't convinced. "She could still be disabled, and Terumi flat-out told us he'd keep on hurting her just to cause more pain if he got a chance. Xion, If you're volunteering to be our team's tank...er, that's a term for the one who takes all the hits so the fragile ones don't have to, you'd better focus on ways to heal and defend yourself, not on inventing new tricks with your extra weapons."

Xion agreed...but with an impish grin, she changed her shirt to read, _"HP: Yes_ ".

"Or I could handle it," Lambda pointed out. "Cure Option!" The halo-like variant of Lambda's Option hovered into position over Xion's head, bathing her in constant healing magic.

Xion pinched her arm to check how fast a Cure Option could heal her, and was satisfied with the result. Even in the process of pinching herself, the Option numbed the pain. "Yep, that works."

"Okay, now that that's mostly settled..." Lambda hopped over to the next platform, noting that the impact from Final Weapon had caused massive damage to the foothold, even on the next platform over. In fact, the damage was so severe that when she landed on the platform, it fell apart, dropping her into the abyss below. On the way down, all she could say was, "...Seriously?!"

 _*KZZZT*_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Mission failed. Try again._

The reset brought the party all the way back to the start of _Area 1-1_ and made Lambda's Option disappear for now. Xion apologized profusely for causing the problem as they made their way back to where Terumi appeared. "Sorry about that! I really had no idea the platforms could actually break!"

Namine told her, _"No one's blaming you."_

Lambda agreed. "Yeah, if anything, we should blame Terumi for adding a mid-boss encounter where there shouldn't have been one."

Luckily, Terumi wasn't at the same spot this time. Kairi sighed in relief. "Thank goodness. He's probably off in Midnight Town, stealing a new outfit. Hmm, if that's the case, it means that by leaving the world, he wasn't affected by the reset."

Lambda checked. "Observing...confirmed." He'd gotten himself a Black Coat in the interim, thankfully, or Lambda would have seen things mortal minds were not meant to witness.

Hazama chuckled. "You're just as sharp as a butterfly knife, aren't you, Kairi?"

Lambda made a dismissive gesture. "I prefer broadswords and buzz-saws, personally."

The party passed the edge of the map before anything more could be said; there wasn't anything special about the series of platforms that had broken before.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Area 2-1..._

"Well, if you like buzz-saws, you're in luck," Xion told Lambda as the group approached the next obstacle: four consecutive platforms with loud, sharp buzz-saws endlessly circling around each foothold's perimeter.

Lambda grimaced. "Only if they're used on things other than myself. This, though? This is going to suck."

"For me, this obstacle is no different from the others." Hazama snickered as he used Ouroboros to vault over the dangerous blocks, once again pushing the others into action by dragging the screen with him. Xion skipped the first three platforms with her Glide, making an easy crossing, but Kairi and Lambda had a bit more trouble again.

"Hey, don't just...!" Kairi saved her breath for dodging the whirling blades of death. All four saws moved at the same speed, but at slightly different positions on the platform, which made the timing tricky to get all the way across. To be absolutely sure, she had to backtrack in the middle.

Lambda followed her lead, getting a better grasp on the limits of her own aerial mobility in the process. Specifically, she had to lunge her legs forward to avoid clipping a buzz-saw during one of her landings. Kairi was a bit more naturally agile than Lambda, so there was a slight difference in what they could achieve with Lambda's mobility Ars. In the end, however, all four rookie platformers made it across the buzzing platforms of doom without injury.

On the next large platform, they had a short breather to take in their surroundings, which now seemed to be inside a cave, though an absurdly spacious one. Glowing blue mushrooms along wall in the background provided plenty of illumination to see, but some hung down from the ceiling up ahead, dripping some kind of luminescent slime at regular intervals. Xion mused, "I wonder what happens if we get hit by those drips? Poison? Blindness? Hallucinations?"

"I think your Glide ability is making you a bit complacent about the potential dangers here," Lambda grumbled.

"Well, _you_ cross first on the next obstacle, then," Xion replied.

Kairi took the lead instead. She ducked past the dripping slime and motioned everyone else to follow, but the next pit seemed impassable. There weren't any enemies to hop on, platforms to scale, or...

*Blip*

A tiny, square platform appeared with a white flash...

*Blip*

...Only to disappear again. "...Oh, no," Kairi groaned.

"I think I see what the next obstacle is," Lambda muttered with equal disdain.

*Blip*

The platform reappeared, and another one showed up right past it, blinking in and out at a different interval.

Xion scratched her head. "Huh, this is a doozy. We can't even see the whole sequence of disappearing platforms from here."

Lambda asked, "Hazama, how long can you hang from Ouroboros in midair?"

Hazama provided an odd frame of reference. "Long enough to stalk someone during a secret meeting, why?"

Lambda explained, "Could you hang out a bit further ahead to see more of the puzzle? It would help a lot."

"Why, certainly. You just try not to fall. It would be a real pain getting back here." Hazama launched Ouroboros and zipped half the screen's width ahead, revealing seven more blocks, but it was clear that there was still more of the puzzle they couldn't see.

"I...can't guarantee I'll make this on the first try," Kairi hesitantly admitted.

Lambda agreed, "Yeah, especially with two of us trying to fit on those platforms. I wonder...yeah, that should work. Custom Option design finalized. 'Tow Option', standing by." A new, purple Option type appeared over her shoulder in a flash of purple light. It was shaped like an upside-down bowl, or perhaps a jellyfish, considering the flexible, hook-ended cable dangling down from somewhere inside it. The Option hovered over behind Kairi and hooked onto the black hood attached to her dress' straps, then rose up and lifted Kairi with it.

"Whoa! Give me some warning next time!" Kairi grabbed her dress around the skirt to stop it from pulling up too far.

Lambda shrugged. "Couldn't you tell what it would do by its shape? I just figured your hood should be useful for _something_ , since you never seem to actually wear it. Anyway, the Tow Option type can't be used to carry myself, so I'll do the actual platforming alone while the rest of you fly or swing over. Route and timing confirmed. Beginning advance."

Kairi dramatically moaned, "Nooo, my accessories have betrayed me!" She made it obvious that she was joking, though, since Lambda actually had a good point.

Lambda hopped on the platforms with perfect timing. Forward, forward, two forward, one back, two forward, forward, pause a little longer, forward.

Hazama dropped from his chain momentarily before launching himself farther ahead. "Wow, this section just keeps going!" Ahead were eight more platforms, along with more dripping mushrooms on the ceiling. Hazama squinted at one (which was hard to discern since his eyes were always shut anyway), then leaned away from it in disgust. "Definitely not edible."

"Would you have actually eaten it if it was?" Xion asked as she Glided over to him. She couldn't Glide the whole way across the pit, so she touched down on one of the platforms before jumping again and hovering in place, ready to match Lambda's pace.

Lambda picked a platform with a particularly fast vanishing rate and hopped up and down on it as she calculated the next route. "Beginning advance." Forward, forward, forward, two forward, pause, skip the spikes, forward, up and back, forward...

"Ack!" Kairi yelped and thrashed about as a drip from one of the mushrooms landed on her face. "Ew ew ew, it's gross! ...Huh? I can't see anything! Well, except what's right around me, which isn't very helpful." 

Forward, forward, two forward... Lambda continued to platform without getting too distracted. "Really? I guess it only affected you. I was worried that anything that affected vision would hit all of us, since we're all sharing the same view."

"Did you let that drip hit me on purpose?! It tastes awful!" Kairi tried to wipe the gunk off her face with her hands, which didn't work very well, but it vanished on its own after a few seconds, allowing her full range of vision to return.

Lambda shot back, "Of course not! What if it _did_ blind us all? Or cause hallucinations? And I didn't want you to get hit with it either way. I'm really sorry. I guess I didn't split my focus well enough to fly you along at the right speed." Luckily, the disappearing block section finally seemed to be coming to an end. "Phew! Solid ground! Cure!" She cast a minor healing spell on Kairi, just in case the shroom juice caused any damage.

The Tow Option set Kairi down on the large, solid platform at the end of the pit, then vanished with another purple flash. The Princess of Heart smoothed out her dress, took a deep breath, and calmed down. "...Okay, I believe you. At least we seem to be getting close to the end." She pointed at a swirling green save point just up ahead.

"Or this could be the middle," Xion pointed out.

"We'll see." Lambda touched the save point, causing it to swirl up into a bright pillar of Light for a second. "At least we won't have to do the disappearing blocks or the buzz-saws again before dealing with whatever's up..." She suddenly received a proximity alert. "Threat detected. If I can sense it before we can see it, it must be strong; maybe it's the boss! Scanning...scan complete."

Surprisingly, a green-bordered window popped up in the upper-left corner of the screen, titled " _TARGET DATA ACQUIRED_ " along its top border. Inside the window was a picture of the enemy in question, along with the following information:

" _Target ID: Heartless_

 _-Type:_ Violet Toadstool

 _Threat Level: S_

 _Physical strength rating: A_

 _Magical strength rating: A_

 _General defensive rating: S_

 _Mobility: S_

 _Notes: Capable of releasing a large cloud of poison unless attacked constantly. Immune to all available status effects. No notable weaknesses or resistances detected._

 _Recommended strategy: position allies to cover likely escape routes._

The picture showed a roughly human-shaped and human-sized Heartless with a round, black head showing the distinctive yellow eyes all Heartless shared. Atop its head was a wide, red cap with swirly, black markings that did make it look like a mushroom. Furthering that impression, the rest of its body was covered by a vivid purple cloak that dragged along the ground, obscuring whatever its feet might have looked like. It didn't have any visible claws, jaws, or weapons, and its arms looked like floppy noodles. All in all, the _Violet Toadstool_ didn't seem very intimidating at first glance. But it was rated as an S-tier threat?

Xion asked, "Is that what your scanning protocols look like to you, Lambda?"

"That's all of the kinds of information I usually get from enemies, but it doesn't usually create a pop-up in my field of vision. I guess that's just how Merlin translated it to something your meat-brains can read."

Hazama chuckled. "Do I detect a note of superiority in your voice?"

Lambda shrugged. "More like the pendulum is swinging the other way; I started out feeling pretty inferior to pretty much everyone due to not being human, but Riku pointed out all the advantages I have. Then again, humans would probably be able to figure this stuff out without needing to do the scan, so it all evens out. I'm still the best hacker in our group, though."

Xion wondered, "Is my brain made of meat, ice, or what? I'm pretty sure my mind works differently from a normal person's, since all the memories I've...received...are perfectly organized."

Kairi shrugged. "There's no way to know what your brain looks like unless your reckless streak gets your head split open. Well, there'll be time to wonder about that later. Let's fight!"

She dashed forward, and as she did so, the camera zoomed out to show the whole boss arena: three medium-sized platforms, with the middle one placed slightly lower than the two on the sides. The Violet Toadstool bounced up and down on the middle platform, appearing just as it did in Lambda's scan report.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Defeat the Violet Toadstool!_

Kairi scored a leaping slash on the mushroom Heartless and then continued attacking, but it didn't do anything in response. It did make a funny *squeak* sound every time it was hit, though. "Am I doing any damage?"

Lambda replied, "Scanning...yes, but not much. Its durability is almost off the charts. Hopefully we can keep it tied down..."

Of course, at that moment, the Heartless seemed to bounce off Kairi's next attack, sailing over to the right-hand platform. Xion used a few Air Slides to catch up. "I got it!" A few attacks later, it bounced again, this time to the left-hand platform. "Lambda, it's coming your way!"

"Fire Option!" A fireball-shaped Option appeared over Lambda's head, dousing the Violet Toadstool in a stream of flames as it approached. Unfortunately, although the fire did a lot of constant damage, it didn't make the Heartless flinch. It leaned in and wobbled its arms at Lambda, who tried to ward it off with her Keyblade. One of its arms got under her guard, however, dealing an attack that seemed to be a gentle brush, but had enough force behind it to blast Lambda to the edge of the platform. "Ouch..."

Hazama crossed his arms at Lambda's sloppy swordplay. "I'd pick up the slack, but you girls have to be the ones to beat the boss. Now, if you'll excuse me..." He launched Ouroboros at the center of the ceiling and stayed there for the rest of the battle, just in time for the Heartless to start stomping the ground and blowing out a huge, purple cloud of poison.

Coughing, Lambda jumped out of the cloud and air dashed to the center platform. "Whoa, I'm already dizzy...my auto-repair is handling it, though. Tow Option!" She created the jellyfish-like Option from earlier and set it hovering between the two platforms. "New plan! If we can blast it out of that cloud, I can catch it mid-jump!"

"I've got you covered! Holy!" Kairi pressed a hand to her chest and closed her eyes in concentration, bringing down a massive pillar of Light onto the platform occupied by the boss. As she expected, this wasn't enough to destroy the annoying mushroom, but it was enough to make it jump to another platform.

"Gotcha!" Lambda's plan bore fruit as the boss' trajectory passed right through the hook of her Tow Option. Snagged by the underside of its cap, the Violet Toadstool was left to dangle helplessly in midair. Lambda had kept her earlier Fire Option active, so she had it fly out of the poison cloud and start torching the boss. "Just a few more seconds and it'll be ready to slice and serve!" 

"I'll do the slicing!" Xion leaped at the hapless Heartless and cleaved it down the middle with Forget-Me-Not, releasing its heart. "Another one down! That's three Training Worlds completed!"

Kairi pulled out the TP Tracker she'd bought on the earlier shopping trip and checked her score. _Shared TP: 5500._ She reported, "We've almost doubled our TP! That boss was worth a lot of money, like any good pinata enemy. But where's the Practice Keyhole?" Luckily, she didn't have to worry for long.

The screen began to shake as sections fell off the background, revealing nothing but pitch blackness behind it. The fallen were in the shape of a Keyhole. Lambda dismissed her Options and pointed Elysium at the background. "I'll lock this one." She fired a Release beam from her Keyblade, which traveled a deceptively long distance before striking the giant Keyhole. The blackness behind it brightened into a blinding Light that drowned out the whole screen.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Training Worlds: Hub..._

When the party could all see again, they were back in the familiar hub room with its normal rules of perspective and motion. "That's convenient; we didn't need a save point to come back this time." Lambda sighed in relief. "That world was stressful."

Roxas was there to greet them again...and the first thing he did was punch Xion in the shoulder. "What were you _thinking_ , letting Terumi beat you up so badly? What if the life-link didn't work as advertised?"

Xion frowned seriously. "If it didn't, then we would've been doomed anyway. I'm sorry I made you worry, though."

Hazama pointed out, "You wouldn't necessarily be doomed; I was there too. Let me have a shot at kicking his ass next time!"

Roxas maintained his glare at Xion for a few more seconds, then cracked a grin. "I forgive you, but at least _try_ to defend yourself next time, okay?"

"Sure thing. I'm already treading too close to some dangerous anime cliches by wearing a T-Shirt that says I'm invincible." Xion changed her shirt's slogan to read: " _Only Mostly Invincible_ ".

Roxas chuckled. "Ha ha, very funny."

Kairi cut in, "I don't know about the rest of you, but I could use some shut-eye. Can we head to an inn in Midnight Town?"

"Sure, I'm exhausted." Lambda headed over to the first door.

Hazama agreed, "It has been a rather exciting day. A day for me, at least. You three have been at it for a whole week." He pulled the World Clock out of his jacket with a flourish. "And before you ask where I got this neat doodad, Xion's pockets don't do crap to stop pickpockets. Try actually using that Bag of Holding you have."

He tossed the clock to Xion, who stuffed it in her blue-laced pouch. "...I'll be sure to keep that in mind. Let's get some sleep."

Lambda opened the door and sent the party back to RE: Midnight Town.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: Holy procrastinators, Batman, it's been almost three months! At least I have some idea of what the next Training World will be like already._

 _Special thanks to FierceDeityMask for steadfastly fighting the insidious forces of procrastination, and for helping me design the Violet Toadstool!_


	9. Actual Sleep

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 9: Actual Sleep**

 **-"Your Actions Are Totally Illogical."-**

 _A/N: So, my birthday went by...a while ago._

 _Wouldn't you know it,_ Xenoblade Chronicles 2 _had ANOTHER huge update recently - apparently the last one. There's a whole new story mode, starting from Level 1, so of course I found there was lots of grinding to be done. Still, I crushed it in a week. I can't excuse the two months between my birthday and the update, though..._

 _Thanks for waiting! Hopefully I managed to make this more entertaining than a rest break has any right to be. Like, extreme action-packed sleeping._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Midnight Town: Town Square..._

The party appeared back in the park at the center of Midnight Town. Lambda mused, "Now, where would the inn be?"

Hazama answered immediately, "I saw it on West Street while I was swinging around, before heading east."

Kairi blinked. "Really? But didn't you go off swinging to the north?"

Hazama dialed up his usual smugness a bit more. "Naturally, an officer of the Intelligence Division must maintain a keen situational awareness at all times. I highly recommend it for everyone, actually. More often than not, keeping an eye out will save you from nasty surprises."

 _"I've got that covered for her,"_ Namine replied. _"It helps that I don't have to focus on moving in combat or anything, and I can see in all directions. So please put the knives away, okay?"_

"Good to know at least one of you has your nose to the grindstone. Ding ding ding! You pass!" Hazama responded as he took his hands off the knives in his pockets. "Anyway, it's not like the 'inn' was hard to spot. It's more of a luxury hotel, and it's so huge, you can almost see it from here. Just look for the big neon sign that says 'Inn Name Only'. It's pretty close by."

"Wow, that pun..." Kairi rolled her eyes, then let out a big yawn. "Pun or not, though, I really need some sleep. Let's go."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Midnight Town: West Street..._

Hazama wasn't kidding; the hotel was only a few doors down the street from the intersection. Even so, the party passed several enticing stalls featuring various kinds of games.

Hazama side-eyed a tent with a large sign in front, featuring a mildly anthropomorphic dog playing an acoustic guitar on a tiny island, along with a speech bubble: "Play all day on DJ K.K.'s Cray-Cray Cay! Dodge all the flying music note balloons to win up to 800 TP!" The ex-Captain smirked. _Win easy money, and look smooth while doing it? They won't know what hit them...well, what they didn't hit._

Lambda focused on the food court. There were so many flavors she hadn't gotten a chance to experience yet! _Those chocolate oranges look yummy!_

Xion had her eye on "Test Your Might": the easily recognizable carnival game involving a squeaky hammer, a button, a pole, and a bell. A few prizes in plastic cases surrounded the pole, ranging from tiny stuffed kittens for the "80% Wimp" tier all the way up to an Orichalcum Ring ("Plus 4 Magic, Plus 2 Strength") for the "100% Mighty" tier. While Xion was confident in her ability to win the game, she also wondered if she could form a new weapon, such as a hammer, out of her memories of Sora's special moves, adding to the four unique weapons she already had. _Wait, I have five weapons, counting the Keyblade. I've gotta remember, this whole place is for Keyblade training._ But since only Xion had this unique ability, then shouldn't she try to strengthen it, too? After all, they had plenty of time. _Hmm, " Impact" is a pretty good name, actually. I hope it works tomorrow._

Kairi, meanwhile, was interested in "Spring Falls: Final Mix". It seemed to be a virtual reality arcade based on the Training World she and her friends had just conquered...but with the difficulty raised through the roof. The prize for completing all eight remixed levels (meaning the party was allowed to stop very early in the actual Training World) was listed as a whopping 20,000 TP! _Challenge accepted,_ Kairi thought to herself.

Namine cautioned, _"I think you should wait until tomorrow to try it, Kairi. That game looks brutal."_

Kairi jumped a little. She asked aloud, "Wha - Namine, you heard that?"

 _"Yes. I can't hear anyone else's thoughts, though, just yours."_

"But you could use your memory-reading powers to get the gist of most people's thoughts with a slight delay, right?" Hazama deduced.

 _"...Yes, I could,"_ Namine admitted, _"but I'd rather just ask if I can. I try to leave you all at least some privacy. Besides, most of us usually think out loud anyway...and you're still immune, Hazama."_

Hazama shrugged. "The more you know..."

"Well, I don't know about the rest of you," Lambda spoke up, then yawned loudly before finishing her sentence, "but I don't plan to do any thinking for the next several hours. We're here."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Midnight Town: Inn Name Only..._

The interior of the hotel was just as huge and fancy as the exterior. Marble floors, mirrored walls, and a golden chandelier hanging from the ceiling high above seemed to make the whole place glitter. A few expensive leather couches were arranged in the middle of the lobby, but these just made a point of how comfy the actual beds must be.

The party looked to the other side of the room, where there was a counter with a single NPC standing behind it. His nametag read "Innkeeper". A sign next to him listed "30 TP per room per night, any size". Lambda noted, "Whoa, for such a classy place, that's really cheap! One room is barely more expensive than a meal at the fast-food place across town!"

The NPC greeted them. "Hello, ladies and gentleman, and welcome to Inn Name Only, the best and only choice of lodgings for off-world travelers in Midnight Town! How many rooms would you like?"

Kairi answered, "Um, two will be enough, I think. Lambda, are you okay with sleeping on the couch?" She was still getting over the fact that the NPC was actually named Innkeeper.

Lambda shrugged. "I'll be fine."

The NPC accepted 60 Shared TP and gestured to a door beside the counter. "Good, good. Your rooms are right down that hall. You may feel some slight disorientation as the hall rearranges itself to lead only you to your rooms."

Xion nodded; no wonder the hotel was so big despite not having any elevators or stairs. "Good to know; that'll also help keep the rooms secure, right?" Terumi wouldn't be able to sneak in and stab them in their sleep here.

"Our hotel has the best security TP can buy - your sleep is safe with us. Good night, esteemed guests." The girls nodded and walked down the hall.

Hazama tried to follow, but the hall stretched out before him, pulling the girls ahead until they were out of sight, and only then was he allowed to move forward. He shrugged and opened the door to Room 666 at the end of the hall, then snapped his fingers to shift his outfit to a simple set of white pajamas, complete with a floppy nightcap - a natural extension of the trick he used to re-summon his fedora whenever he lost it. He flopped into bed and fell into a dreamless sleep.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Realm of Sleep] [Kairi's POV] Prankster's Paradise..._

It took Kairi a moment to realize she was dreaming...even though what she was watching was too over-the-top to be real.

As a floating, invisible presence, she saw that Sora was there flying over an endless ocean...by riding on top of a giant bubble that contained a live whale! From the muddy recollections she'd gathered from inside Sora's a year ago, Kairi recognized the whale as Monstro, a denizen of Jiminy Cricket's homeworld who was the size of an entire world by himself. The bubble encasing Monstro rushed forward much faster than Kairi expected from an object of its size, in hot pursuit of a giant, crustacean-like monster - one of the Dream Eaters Yen Sid spoke of, a boss-level Nightmare: _Chill Clawbster._

Sora weaved left and right to dodge volleys of energy rings and lasers as the Nightmare desperately tried to literally burst his bubble. In the end, though, Sora got close enough to finish the fight by exploding the bubble, which blasted himself over the horizon on a spray of salt water as a side effect of the attack. Monstro was now free to _eat_ Chill Clawbster with a vengeful roar that sounded like it shouldn't have come from a whale. The boss was large, but it simply couldn't compare to the world-sized sea mammal. Like everything else Monstro wanted to eat, the Nightmare went down in one gulp.

 _"That was crazy,"_ Kairi murmured to herself, _"But at least I know Sora's still doing well at his own test!"_

Her dream then shifted into a more normal kind of nonsense. Something about tickets, diamonds, and a horse...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Realm of Sleep] [Xion's POV] Prankster's Paradise: Inside Monstro..._

Xion realized immediately that she was dreaming...about being inside Riku's dream...which was inside Sora's dream...which was inside Pinocchio's world's dream. _"How should I even describe this?"_ A muffled foghorn could be heard from some boat outside the surreal walls of Monstro's innards, making a distinctive BWOOOHN noise. _"...Yeah, that about sums it up."_

Riku, standing a few feet away, couldn't hear her. He was focused on the person in a Black Coat leading the puppet boy, Pinocchio, deeper into the Bowels. "Who are you?"

The guy stopped, turned around, and shoved the living puppet toward Riku. Then he removed his hood and smirked.

The dream world's Jiminy Cricket and Riku reacted the same way. "What?!"

Riku soon realized what was happening. "...Oh, it's another one. I gave in to the Darkness once, and ever since, it's followed me around in one form or another. Ansem - er, Xehanort's Heartless...a puppet Replica made from the shadows in my heart...and now, I'm fighting me."

The exact duplicate of Riku, but with his hairstyle from a year ago, grinned wider. "Sorry, not quite. After all, _you're_ you. Isn't that right, Real Thing?"

Riku was taken aback. "Then...you really are the Replica from back then? How are you here, though? Come to think of it, I never even went through Monstro back in Castle Oblivion. Are you here because I skipped it somehow?"

The Replica shrugged. "First: don't think about Castle Oblivion's floor plan too hard. It changes all the time; even the Organization could never figure it out. As for why I'm here, all I know is that you were right. My heart did go to the same place as yours. And your heart is right here."

"What are they talkin' about, Jiminy?" Pinocchio asked in a whisper. "I'm all confused."

Jiminy scratched his head. "I'm sure I have no idea, Pinoke. Let's just get you back to your father. Things will make more sense there." He bounced back up the tunnels, and Pinocchio loped after him.

Riku clenched his fist, too lost in his own memories to pay attention to the residents of this world. "But I annihilated your body! You were _dead!_ I mean, I'm not opposed to giving you a second chance, but aren't people supposed to stay dead after you ram a sword through their guts? I wasn't even using a Keyblade! How were you able to come back?" Riku tried to focus on how little sense this made, rather than on whether or not he should be feeling guilty about killing the Replica in the first place.

The Replica chuckled. "Have you forgotten? This whole world is a dream. Reality is...iffy here, and I noticed one of the dream figments was a shadow of you, so I stepped out and took its place. I don't know for sure if I'll still exist after you move on from this little world-inside-a-world, but unlike you, I don't look gift horses in the mouth. I want to make the most of this second chance."

The Replica was suddenly shrouded in a sphere of Darkness, which vanished just as quickly to reveal the boy clad in a familiar skirt...er, suit. "After all, you look like you could use a reminder of how strong the Power of Darkness is." The Replica summoned his Soul Eater sword in a threatening manner...but then extended a hand for a handshake. "Want to take on the Dream Eater in the next room together?"

The real Riku grinned. "Sure...uh, what should I call you now?"

The Replica shrugged. "Well, as things stand, I'm the only Replica that actually looks like my original. Vexen said Xion was a more successful subject, but on different standards. I say _I'm_ the only 'Replica' there is! I'm going to take that loaded label and clean out all the bias against it!"

"Then it's good to have you back, Replica." They shook hands firmly, and turned toward the sound of roaring from the next room with identical confidence.

Xion smiled as the dream faded away. _"I can't wait to meet him for real, but I bet Namine would be even happier about this."_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[The Training Worlds] [Namine's POV] Inn Name Only: Room 601..._

Namine was dreaming about a memory of what had happened to Roxas in the virtual Twilight Town. Frustratingly, when she got to the part where DiZ and Axel started yelling, "Roxas! Roxas! Roxas!" the whole scene just got stuck in a loop and stayed there until she woke up.

Namine came back to consciousness with a headache, so she manifested herself to keep any pain from being shared with Kairi and waking her. As she appeared in the hotel room, she caught sight of Lambda leaving.

 _"What's she up to...?"_ Since Lambda was already too far away to ask, Namine reached out to read her memories. After she finished checking Lambda's memories from the last few minutes (including the resource logs), Namine was satisfied that nothing particularly shady was afoot. She laid back down to sleep, looking forward to enjoying those mini-games with the rest of the party the next day. Her dreams were vague, but pleasant.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Lambda's POV] A few minutes earlier..._

Lambda had fallen asleep on the couch easily enough, but she woke up almost immediately. Checking her logs, she found that she'd been subjected to a powerful Cure effect as soon as she fell asleep in this room. The thing about Cure spells, though, was that they recharged Lambda's energy reserves as a side effect, as she'd learned in the aftermath of a particularly stressful battle against a _Dustflier_ during the previous adventure. She woke up when she got back to full charge by force of habit. She rolled her eyes in the dark, then finished defragging her mind and archiving yesterday's data, which took only a few more minutes.

Now Lambda had a lot of extra time on her hands for training. She left the hotel and picked a Heartless-infested alleyway at random.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Midnight Town: Northwest Quadrant..._

As a gaggle of boring Soldiers materialized to attack Lambda, she realized that she should have left a message or something for the others. That gave her an idea for a new Option. "Comms Option!" The new drone had the appearance of an old-school movie projector, but with the film reels on the bottom like wheels. The Comms Option moved by floating, just like all the others, so wheels weren't strictly necessary to add, but Lambda liked the look. She tested it, and was able to link her senses of sight and hearing to the lens on the front of the Option. With this, she would be able to scout distant areas with more detail than her long-range scanning protocols could provide, and it could project a hologram of Lambda's image and voice to converse with people far away. However, the Comms Option lacked any weapons of its own, making it risky to use as an S.O.S. signal, and it definitely couldn't travel to other worlds for her.

Lambda sent the Option back to the atrium of Inn Name Only, then focused on wiping out the Soldiers with magic. A few Fire and Blizzard spells broke them up for a while, giving her time to dismiss Elysium, dig into her Pouch of Holding, and pull out the book Hazama had given her back in Spring Falls: _There Goes a Keyblade Glider!_

The childish-looking book had only a few thick, cardboard pages, but it contained several amazing revelations about the nature of the Keyblade. Apparently, all Keyblades could transform into at least one different weapon type. With sufficient skill, most of them could then progress to a more powerful weapon for a devastating combo attack. Beyond that, a lucky few Keyblade designs had the ability to transform into something called a Keyblade Glider: a flying vehicle that could open portals to the "Lanes Between" and allow a Keybearer to travel between worlds.

"Well, I probably shouldn't open a portal to the Lanes Between from the Training Worlds, but the Glider itself..." Seeing no reason not to check if she could do it, Lambda put the book away and re-summoned Elysium. Holding the Keyblade at her side, she tossed it behind her. It flew away over the roofs of the buildings, twinkled among the stars in the perpetually-darkened sky, and returned in two pieces.

The new shapes zoomed back to Lambda and latched onto her legs, lifting her into the air via small green thrusters along the backs of her legs and from the bottoms of her pointed feet. With delight, she recognized her old Battle Mode's leg blades! These weren't quite the same as the ones that came with Murakumo's armor, though. For one thing, they had a black paint job with glowing green borders at the joints. For another, they had vastly superior mobility. Where Lambda's old Battle Mode could slowly hover in midair or dash along the ground, Elysium's Glider form was capable of full, omnidirectional flight.

"Ha ha! Goodbye, clumsiness and slowness!" Lambda did a few loop-de-loops above the skyline. She was finally able to appreciate the rush of freedom that made everyone else seem to love moving so fast.

"Look out below!" She then swooped back down into the alleyway and punted a newly-spawned Soldier into a wall. Spinning in place with her right leg out, she launched Fire spells from the tip of her foot to burst a squad of Shadows all around her, then backflipped repeatedly to kick a Large Body into the air and shred it like a buzz-saw.

"Yahoo! This is exactly what I wanted!" She summoned a basic Option to her side and strafed over the next alleyway, slaying a whole squad of tiny, Soldier-like _Deserters_ before they could flee.

"Hmm...custom design finalized. Gravity Option!" Her summoned Option transformed into a tiny, boxy satellite, complete with wide, rectangular solar panel wings. This Option constantly projected a translucent, purple column of increased gravity comparable to Murakumo's Gravity Seed technique or a Gravira spell. A squad of multicolored spellcaster Heartless was squished to the ground below her as she returned to the hotel, more than satisfied with her progress.

As she landed and dismissed Elysium, she mused to herself, "Huh, I must have expanded my mana pool a lot recently. That was way more spells than I can usually cast."

Meanwhile, in a dark alley Lambda had passed over without looking earlier, Terumi hissed in displeasure. "You are _so_ lucky that my new power-up isn't ready yet. C'mon..." Raw Darkness continued to gather at his feet, sucking in and assimilating any Heartless that dared to spawn near him...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Kairi's POV] The next day... Inn Name Only: Room 601..._

Kairi woke up easily, feeling well-rested. Namine was still snoring, though. With a shrug, Kairi dove into her own heart to check up on her.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Station of Clarity..._

Kairi touched down on the well-lit stained glass that represented her heart. Namine was there; the dream bubble over her head showed her drawing a portrait of Hazama, who was holding a pose as if saying, _Draw me like one of your French Grimoires._ Kairi giggled at the scene. "Even in dreams, he's always so dramatic."

Kairi tiptoed over and nudged Namine's shoulder, causing her to jolt awake. "Kairi?! How did you get here?"

Kairi raised an eyebrow. "Um...it _is_ my heart. Am I not supposed to be able to dive into it?"

Namine shook her head. "I've never heard of anyone being able to visit their heart's Station at will before. Then again, yours is completely different from most people - even the other Princesses of Heart have a different design on their Stations of Awakening. The difference might be because you have a Keyblade."

Kairi shrugged. "I suppose, although I don't know when you would have seen the other Princesses' Stations."

"Sora's Keyblade test took him to several of them," Namine answered.

"Huh, weird. Lambda just had her own Station in several colors, right? As for me, this place is... _The Station of Clarity_? So that's what it's called."

Namine blinked. "Did you hear that voice again?"

"Yeah. But you know, we really should be getting up."

"...Oh, right! I'm sorry for sleeping in."

"Don't worry about it. I'm glad we had a chance to chat in private, at least. See you soon, Namine."

"Anytime, Kairi."

Kairi created a save point at her feet and disappeared back to the waking world.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Back in Room 601..._

Xion was still asleep when Kairi returned from the Station of Clarity. Remembering what happened last time someone shook Xion awake, Kairi opted to take a shower and hope the Replica woke up on her own...but looking around, there wasn't any door that could lead to a bathroom. "What gives? How am I supposed to wash up or use the restroom? ...And now that I'm thinking about it, why don't I need to do either of those things?"

 _"Just another convenient magic trick of the hotel, I think,"_ Namine answered, before recounting what she'd learned about the hotel from Lambda's memories and activity logs.

"I knew it!" Kairi exclaimed, in response to the news that sleeping at the inn meant full healing. She was loud enough that Xion groaned and woke up while Namine was still finishing up the explanation.

"Hey, Kairi. What's got you so excited?" Xion rubbed the sleep from her eyes, stood up, and slipped on her shoes, which she'd left by the foot of the bed. She opted not to change the phrase on her T-shirt yet.

Kairi shrugged. "We just found more video game comparisons...I'm sorry for shouting. By the way, did you have any...weird dreams? I dreamed that Sora put Monstro in a bubble to chase a giant crab with it. I think that's what he was doing in the Sleeping Worlds." Kairi couldn't quite remember her other dream, but the one with the giant Dream Eater definitely happened.

"I think you're right. My dream was sort of similar..." Xion recounted her dream about Riku's Mark of Mastery test, which was still perfectly clear in her head.

Namine manifested herself to express her surprise. _"The Riku Replica came back, too? I...wasn't expecting that."_

Xion grinned. "Yep. Isn't that great, Namine? This means everyone who got messed up at Castle Oblivion last year is back to normal!"

 _"Yes. It's a huge relief... Finally, all the people I hurt back then have been healed!"_ Namine smiled brightly, but a few tears escaped her eyes and sparkled out of existence as they fell.

Kairi frowned at her. "Namine, you know none of that was really your fault, right?"

 _"I believe it_ was _partly my fault, but don't worry. After this, I feel like I can finally forgive myself."_

Xion changed her shirt to say, "# _ReplicaLivesMatter_ ". She mentioned, "We should find Lambda and tell her the good news. She went out training, right? I hope she didn't run into Terumi or anything..."

"Hey, girls!" Lambda walk into the room right at that moment, saving everyone the trouble of searching for her. "Did you all sleep okay?"

Kairi nodded. "Yeah."

Namine shrugged. _"Kinda. I woke up early and saw you leaving the room, so I checked your memories. I hope you don't mind."_

Xion grinned excitedly. "We're better than okay! Wait 'til you hear this...!"

Lambda and the others shared what they'd been up to.

"...So in conclusion, everyone's doing great, we're all getting stronger, Riku made a new friend, and it's time to play some minigames!" Kairi pointed the way and flung open the door back to the hotel lobby. Namine vanished back into her heart as she marched out.

Lambda mumbled, "...Minigames? Okay, I think I can guess what she means." She and Xion followed behind Kairi.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Midnight Town: West Street..._

The girls met up with Hazama on their way outside and exchanged reports, although Hazama's night was completely uneventful - no weird dreams or anything. (Kairi and Namine giggled to each other at that news, for some reason.)

Kairi announced, "Okay, gang, let's split up and check out the minigames!"

Xion held up a hand. "Hold your Gummi Ships, Kairi. You should never split up the gang if there's a villain in the vicinity."

"Oh, right!" Lambda exclaimed. "Let me check on Terumi. Scanning...Observing...what in the worlds? All I'm getting is a bunch of cloudy Darkness."

 _"That must be related to the 'power-up' he mentioned last time,"_ Namine guessed. _"Is your Observation still stable enough to work, at least?"_

Lambda checked to make sure. "Running checksum...no errors found. It looks like we'll be okay. And with all the power he's giving off, it wouldn't be too hard to find him and re-establish the Observation directly if it becomes a problem."

Kairi added, "Plus, he's giving himself a serious elemental disadvantage against most of us. What's he thinking? He must know he can't beat Roxas, myself, Sora, or Riku with Darkness, right?"

"Then do you think he's going to go after Lambda or me, despite the reasons he can't kill us?" Xion asked.

"I can't wait to find out." Hazama licked his lips in anticipation. "Remember, girls, it's my turn to humiliate him this time!"

Kairi laughed nervously. Hazama was acting kind of creepy. "If you say so. But since Terumi seems to be busy at the moment, we have time for minigames!" She dashed off to the VR arcade.

"Okay! I'll have some cool things to show off when I get back!" Xion approached the Test Your Might pole and did some stretches.

Hazama gestured to D.J. K.K.'s Cray-Cray Cay. "You'll probably find me still winning at the one over there."

"Ooh, that smells good..." Lambda mumbled as she headed to the food court further down the road.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _One hour later..._

Everyone reconvened in front of Inn Name Only after playing/eating their fill.

Hazama arrived first and sat down on a bench by the sidewalk to read a little more of _The Official_ _Prima_ _'_ _Kingdom Hearts_ _'_ _Strategy Guide._ Most of the info was a year out of date, but there was a sizable bestiary of Heartless and a list of useful-looking spells and abilities in the appendices. Perhaps there was something worth adding to Hazama's already-impressive skill set.

Xion arrived a few minutes later, wearing an Orichalcum Ring and hugging a giant stuffed Moogle. "Hey, Hazama! I thought you'd still be winning at the dodging game with the long, rhyming name." She sat down next to him on the bench.

Hazama smirked. "Oh, I would've, but the auto-tuned puppy singing the background music started to grate on me. Still won a cool 800 TP, though."

Kairi approached the bench, grumbling to herself. Xion asked, "What's wrong, Kairi? I don't think I've _ever_ seen you this ticked off before."

Kairi's grumbling slowly increased in volume until the others could hear it. "Stupid freaking unfair cheating obnoxious PLATFORM HELL! If it's not the pop-up spikes, it's the platforms disappearing. Or the enemies knocking you onto the spikes. Or the enemies knocking you onto other enemies, and then _they_ knock you into the pit! Or the buzz-saws trailing around thin air right where you need to jump to the next platform, or... *Grumble grumble...*"

Lambda called out as she approached, "It was that bad, huh?"

Kairi took a few deep breaths and clapped her hands against her cheeks, suddenly seeming less angry. "Whew! Calming down...okay. Yes, it _was_ that bad. But I almost had it! I just need a little more practice to get through without taking too much damage so I can beat the boss."

Xion nodded. "Okay. Wait, do you think it's possible to beat the Violet Toadstool with just one party member?"

Kairi rolled her eyes. "Please. The Violet Toadstool was a quarter of the way through. After that it was a nasty red guy that looked like a _Defender_. That _Eliminator_ was a real challenge; I went through ten plays at 10 TP each just because of it. The third boss was Ansem...er, Xehanort's Heartless. He was easy."

Lambda shrugged. "Just call him Ansem. You can call the original Ansem DiZ. But it's a good sign that you were able to beat him so easily!"

"But what if Ansem the Wise is my dad? Anyway, I beat 'X-Heartless' without breaking a sweat, and by then I was really good at dealing with the unfair platforming. But then the last boss was Anti-Sora! Let me tell you, Sai'x was lucky to fight Final Sora instead. Anti-Sora was brutal - fast, strong, maneuverable, and when he got me with just one claw attack, I was suddenly stuck in a huge combo that killed me in seconds." Kairi hung her head in defeat.

Lambda pet Kairi's shoulder and assured her, "Don't worry, there's a solution. You'll just have to boost your speed! I found a shop called _Food in the Buff_ that was selling Power, Magic, Defense, and Speed Boost items! The problem is, they cost 500 of your Bonus TP apiece, so you should probably save up for your unique bonus item first, whatever it is. I spent the extra Bonus TP I got from training last night on a Magic Boost and a Speed Boost, but I wasn't allowed to buy a Power Boost, probably because I gave up the sword in that dream. I'll be way faster in our next battle, though!"

Kairi considered it. "Hmm...sounds intriguing, but I don't know if those boosts would carry over into the virtual reality game. It changed a few things, such as having an HP bar's worth of hits I can take before instant death instead of making me feel pain or break bones. I'll have to look through the shops on East Street to find out what my unique items might be, too."

Xion nodded. "Good plan. Let's all do that, then."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Midnight Town: Town Square, one shopping spree later..._

After a few hours spent checking every shop on East Street, the group figured out what bonus items were available for each of them.

Hazama found a set of beam knives on sale for 2500 TP at _Blades 'R' Us._ His reaction: "Shit, I came up just short. Smart-ass shopkeeper doesn't have any blind spots in his store, either."

The only bonus item available for Namine was the Memory Flasher she saw earlier at _Seers_ , and she was still far from being able to buy it. _"...And I'm still not even sure if I want it."_

Lambda found a strange hair accessory in _Ms. Wardrobe's Wardrobe_ called a "Braid Beam", which could hold a braid together and take advantage of Lambda's prehensile hair to aim and shoot laser beams. "Rats! if I hadn't bought those boost items, I would've had enough TP!"

In the same store, Kairi found an advertisement for something called a "Very Special Outfit", with the following description: "These extraordinary garments, crafted by the good fairies Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather, contain very special powers that allow you to contribute your own power to your friends!" There was no telling what that meant, although Xion and Namine thought the wording seemed familiar. Either way, Kairi was just a little lacking in Bonus TP, just like the others.

All of this left Xion quite pleased that she was able to afford her own bonus item: a little book from _Good To Know_ titled _Armakinesis for Dummies._ From it, she learned a few mental techniques to control her weapons with her mind like the other members of Organization XIII. Minutes after purchasing it, she could make her weapons float in midair around her while summoning a new set of weapons...and levitate those, too! Now she was no longer limited to a single weapon type at a time, which meant she could use her Keyblade and her wings at the same time, just for starters. However, achieving good reaction speeds with more than a few of them at a time took a lot of concentration.

Xion summoned all of her weapons at once and arrayed them around herself as she left the bookstore. "Check it out, I'm a walking armory!"

Namine clapped...which was kind of weird when she wasn't visible _"Impressive!"_

Hazama gave the display a thumbs up. "Adaptable...lethal...I like it!"

Lambda shrugged. "I've seen more. This is definitely a huge improvement, though."

Kairi's eyes glinted in determination. "I'll catch up, just you wait!"

Xion grinned and dismissed her weapons. "I guess our break is over, then. Let's head to the next Training World!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Training Worlds: Hub..._

Roxas was there to greet them when they returned. "Welcome back, everyone. You know the drill; the next Training World is through that door over there. It's supposed to help you get used to worlds with unusual vehicles and other methods of transportation. Some worlds are more spread out than others, after all."

He pointed to the next door in line:

 _Training World 4:_

 _Sky of Battle_

"Your target is a massive flying enemy, of course. Do your best!"

"Sounds cool!" Xion opened the door.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: And there we go. Another one down._

 _I had to change the notes up at the top three times. At this snail's pace, KH3 will be out long before I'm done._


	10. Dreams of Flying

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 10: Dreams of Flying**

 **-"Bet Ya Feel Lighter Now!"-**

 _A/N: Work on this chapter started quickly, compared to the last few. Thank you for nagging, The Mighty Gyarapie!_

 _...On the other hand, then I got stuck in the middle for more than a month again. Still, it's indirectly thanks to The Mighty Gyarapie that I broke out of it - if he hadn't kept constantly disparaging my favorite 3DS eShop shovelware game,_ Iron Combat: War in the Air _, I would've kept trying to work a few cameos from it into this chapter. As soon as I stopped trying to do that, the whole plan clicked into place. Thank you for being mean, The Mighty Gyarapie!_

 _Warning: mild suggestive themes/potential triggers, along with the usual swearing from Hazama, etc. You know the drill._

 _Note: A lot of people will speak mostly in italics in this Training World, not just Namine._

 _Disclaimer: As usual, I don't own_ Kingdom Hearts _or_ BlazBlue _. I also don't own_ Strike Witches _or the rest of the World Witches franchise. If I owned any part of anything presented here,_ Kingdom Hearts III _would take even LONGER to come out, but_ BlazBlue: Centralfiction _would have an English dub_. _No money is being made from this fan-work, etc. etc._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Sky of Battle: Base: Runway..._

The first thing the group noticed was the weather. A warm, clear, sunny day greeted them. They were on a wide, flat road leading directly into a huge hangar, which was part of a larger military base. Even this mild weather made the blacktop under their feet uncomfortably hot...but only two of them were actually standing on the ground.

Taking one look at the setup, Kairi asked, "What are the chances that we actually need to explore this whole base?"

Lambda replied, "Scanning...very low. Remember, our target isn't in there...it's up there!" She pointed into the sky past the end of the runway, although nothing could be seen in that direction except a sparse grassland and some mountains in the distance. Lambda had already located the boss, but it was so far away that the only data she could gather was that its power output was ridiculously strong.

An unknown, deep female voice pointed out, "That's great info and all...but I think our first problem is a bit more immediate!"

Kairi did a double take. "Who's there? ...Wait, is that you, Hazama?! What happened to you?"

It was indeed him...er, her. Her green hair was now much longer, flowing down her back like a cape, which went well with her new black bodysuit and black-painted armor. An angled visor covered Hazama's eyes, obscuring them from view. (There was no red lens visible in the middle of the visor, perhaps as an indication that Hazama's real eyes were always shut anyway.) A metal frame surrounded a modestly-sized pair of breasts covered only by the bodysuit. On her wrists were long gloves of the same material as the bodysuit, and attached to these were a pair of cylindrical devices that looked like guns. Her legs were encased in the signature leg blades of a Murakumo Unit, painted mostly silver instead of black. Lastly, Geminus Anguium: Ouroboros had emerged completely from its portal and now floated behind her back. The head of the chain had bitten the other end and started circling endlessly.

Lambda took a close look. "Scanning...it looks like Hazama's still an Azure Grimoire. The BlazBlue can take whatever form its wielder needs...so I guess that's what happened. It's a good thing he didn't actually transform into a Murakumo Unit; that might have resulted in the Black Beast."

Hazama groaned. "I _knew_ something unsavory was going to happen if I stuck around. On the other hand, I wasn't particularly attached to looking like Terumi. Still, if Merlin was going to prank me by turning me female, couldn't he at least have given me a proper set of boobs?"

"WHAT?!" Kairi flushed beet-red and covered her face.

Hazama smirked. "I suppose that's actually another benefit - more trolling! And hey, I can't complain about the spike-throwing wrist guns!" Hazama raised her arms in front of her, and a pair of extremely sharp spikes burst out of the guns, embedding themselves in the blacktop of the Runway. "I'm still going to change back after we're done with this, though." Ouroboros suddenly unlatched from itself and zipped over to the spent spikes, consuming them so Hazama could launch them again. Then it returned to its new rest position behind her back. "But enough about me - what about all of you? I can see a few changes."

Xion looked down at herself. "Whoa, cool! Look at me, I'm like a super fighting robot!" Her whole body was encased in rounded black armor, with very wide boots and gauntlets. Well, one gauntlet: her right hand was covered by a cannon. Her head was covered by a round helmet with no particularly outstanding features except for the tinted visor over her eyes, while her nose and mouth were left exposed. Judging from the way her eyes could be seen as glowing green circles under the visor, Xion had gained more mechanical aspects than just the armor.

"Let me test a few things..." She summoned Forget-Me-Not to her left hand, but it was a bit too large and cumbersome to wield in a one-handed grip, so she left it levitating by her side. "Good thing I just learned how to do that! Now let's try this cannon...wait, I'm getting some kind of report..." Glowing lines of text flashed on her visor, but since they were reversed and scrolled up out of sight so quickly, no one but her could read them.

"Okay, so that's how it all works. Rocket boots, check." Xion was suddenly lifted into the air by jets of reddish fire from the bottoms of her feet. After a few seconds, she fell back to the ground, bending her knees a bit with the impact as the blacktop cracked slightly. "Well, there's no way I can fly all the way to the boss with just this, but I bet I can make it work if I combine it with Sonic Blade."

"Arm Cannon..." Gripping the cannon with her free hand, she aimed at the spot Hazama hit with her spikes. Yellow light gathered at the end of the cannon, creating a distinct humming sound, and then the cannon spat a ball of yellow plasma about the size of a baseball, which flew straight out of the barrel slower than a bullet but faster than a thrown ball. The plasma shot hit the tarmac and burst with a small explosion, spraying bits of debris every which way. "...Check! I could charge my shot to make it bigger and stronger, too."

Kairi mentioned, "Lucky you; you get to aim! In most games with this sort of weapon, you can only shoot forward."

Ignoring Kairi, Xion grabbed a piece of debris from the explosion and tossed it into the air, deliberately letting it land on her helmet. A grid of blue energy surrounded her whole body from a moment, following the contours of her armor and repelling the mock attack. "Defense screen, check. All of the new features are online and functional."

Lambda gave her a thumbs-up. "Nice!" As for Lambda herself, she suddenly realized that she was also slightly changed, having acquired armor and flight-capable leg blades like Hazama's. She also wore a visor just like her old Battle Mode had. It had been more than a week since she'd worn this visor, but she was still so used to its presence that she hardly noticed when it returned.

Lambda ran a checksum and got back a familiar status report. "I'm all suited up and ready to go, too. Oh, wait, there's one thing I should check..." She summoned Elysium to her hand and sighed in relief that her leg blades were still there. "Good, my Keyblade is freed up to do other things. In fact..." She concentrated on an image of her old Petals. Elysium responded by flashing out of existence in a swirl of green holograms, and a familiar set of eight floating blades appeared by a similar effect behind her back. Their green-edged, black blades shone in the sunlight. "Oh, I have missed these so much! Check out Elysium's alternate **Petal Blades** form, everyone!" Lambda hung them in a circle around her waist and spun them for a second, then dismissed her Keyblade. All of the Petal Blades vanished in swirls of green rectangles.

Kairi nodded appreciatively, but then pouted a little. "How come I'm the only one who didn't get any robot parts?" She still looked exactly the same. "I feel a bit left out."

Hazama shrugged. "Maybe it's an incentive to explore the base and find some way to fly with the rest of us. I mean, there's got to be _something_ you can use in that hangar."

"Good idea, Hazama." Kairi regarded the hangar. The huge, slightly rusty shutter leading onto the runway was closed tight, but problems like this were not problems for Keyblade wielders. She summoned Destiny's Embrace and fired a Release beam, causing the hangar door to glow blue-white for a moment and raise itself smoothly out of sight.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Base: Hangar..._

"And what could be behind door number ONE?!" Xion called out to no one in particular, like a game show host. Adjusting to the lower light inside the hangar, the team saw that there were no planes inside. There was a line of harnesses designed to hold pairs of strange silver-painted devices, though. They looked like they should be worn over one's legs like a Murakumo Unit's leg blades, but these were completely rounded with stubby wings sticking out from the outer sides, rather than flattened on the sides with a cutting blade on the front. There was no knee joint, so the legs of the wearer would be held rigid. The MoogleCorp logo was emblazoned behind each cylinder's wing.

"Are these what I'm supposed to use?" Kairi asked. "Also, before it's too late, will I need some kind of special training to actually fly with these?"

A new, high-pitched voice answered Kairi's questions with a few more questions. "Who are all of you? When did you get here? I thought I was brought here all alone!" Standing in a doorway at the other side of the hangar was a girl no older than Kairi, but almost a full head shorter. Her brown hair had two slightly longer locks that drifted sideways away from her bangs, but she was otherwise fairly nondescript in an adorable-little-kid way.

The most interesting thing about her was what she was wearing...or rather, what she wasn't wearing. She had a sailor uniform top, complete with a blue ascot, and white slippers designed to be easily kicked off, but she wore no skirt or pants at all with the outfit. Luckily, she had a typical one-piece swimsuit underneath the top, but the effect was rather unsettling, to say the least.

If the girl was concerned about her apparent wardrobe malfunction, she showed no sign of it. Rather, she rushed around the harnesses to approach the group with a happy smile. "Oh, thank goodness! I was worried I'd been brought here alone! I just woke up here today, and I thought it was weird that Major Sakamoto hadn't called us out for the morning drills...oh, where are my manners? I'm Sergeant Yoshika Miyafuji! It's nice to meet you! Are those things you're wearing a new kind of Striker Unit?"

Xion blinked behind her visor. "Er, um, er..."

Hazama smiled bemusedly, though with a faint edge of irritation; this "Yoshika" kid had one of the most annoying voices he'd ever heard, and she just seemed to keep talking and talking.

Kairi took point in the conversation, much to Lambda's relief. "Hello, er, Yoshika? Did I say that right? We just arrived here, too. We're here to destroy some kind of giant enemy flying up in the sky, but we have no idea what it is or how I'm going to get up there. These three have their own ways to fly, but I don't. And...what's a 'Striker Unit?'"

"So those suits aren't Striker Units? I thought everyone knew what those were. Without those, the Neuroi would've destroyed the whole world by now!"

"The what did what about what?" Xion mumbled, totally lost.

Lambda decided that they'd never get anywhere without getting a few things straight. "I have no idea what those terms mean, but that's to be expected; we came from a different world. Judging by what you've said, you've come here from a different world, too, but I bet if we accomplish what we came here to do, you can go back to your own world."

Yoshika blinked owlishly. "Really? Are you sure?"

"We have no idea if it'll work, actually," Hazama put in, "but there is a good chance that it's true, and we're going to have to beat up that monster one way or another, so if you have nothing better to do, we'd appreciate any help you can provide. For starters, those things in the harnesses. Are those the Striker Units you've been going on about?"

Yoshika looked behind her and finally noticed the harnesses. "Yes, they are! I've never heard of any manufacturer called 'MoogleCorp', but these are definitely Striker Units! If you can use magic, you can put these on and fly! Don't worry, I was trained as one of the Strike Witches! I can show you how it works...er..."

Kairi giggled as Yoshika tried to convey that she didn't know anyone's name. "My name is Kairi, and I'd love to learn how to fly one of these things. With me are Lambda, Xion, and Hazama." She indicated each of her allies in turn.

"Okay, it's nice to meet you all! Anyway, Kairi, the first thing to do is take your shoes and socks off. You can't put anything that's not skintight inside the Striker Unit, or it'll break." Well, that certainly explained why Yoshika wasn't wearing much on her lower half. The little girl removed her slippers and jumped over the back of one of the harnesses, landing perfectly feet-first in a Striker Unit pair.

Suddenly, dog ears and a short tail unfolded from her head and back, and the Striker Unit loudly roared to life. Tiny blades of blue energy extended from the bottom of the units and spun around like propellers. Yoshika appeared to concentrate for a moment, and created a blue magic circle on the ground below her that pushed her upward a bit, although the harness held her in place. She spoke a bit louder to be heard over the magic engines. "See? That's how you put it on! Then you pull this lever to launch."

Kairi eyed the contraption apprehensively. "Will I get animal ears and stuff, too?"

Yoshika scratched her chin. "I dunno; the only people who can use a Striker in my world are witches, and that's just part of how we use magic. Actually, your world's magic might not even work with the Striker Unit. Don't worry, if it won't work, then the engines just won't start up."

"I'd better try it out, then." Kairi bent down behind the next harness on Yoshika's right and removed her shoes, then untied the ribbons on her feet. "I'm really regretting wearing ribbons instead of socks now."

Namine asked, _"I was meaning to ask, why did you think it was a good idea to put ribbons on your feet in the first place? You knew we were going to be fighting and such. At least that short skirt turned out to be mandatory."_

Yoshika looked around in surprise. "What? Who's there? Is there another person with you, and I just didn't see her?"

Kairi hummed as she finished unlacing her ribbons and shoes and storing them in her Pouch of Holding. "That's Namine. I'll introduce you in a moment." She didn't answer Namine's question.

She jumped over the harness as Yoshika had done, landed in her own Striker, and felt a curious, ticklish buzzing sensation as the engines whirred to life around her legs and began pulling on her mana. The feeling was somewhat disconnected, though; it wouldn't have surprised Kairi if the Striker Unit was bigger on the inside, or perhaps it shunted her legs into another dimension. Luckily, no animal features of any kind sprouted from her body.

"It's working! But...this will drain my mana really fast. The way we use magic must be different from 'witches'. Maybe if I use the Power of Light instead...there!" Kairi gently eased away from the mana drain, causing the propellers of the Striker to slow down, and then funneled some Light from her heart into the machine. Immediately, the propellers whirred back up to full speed, and Kairi could tell that powering them this way was much more sustainable. A fuzzy circle of Light surrounded her feet. The magic circle was nothing like the sharp, intricate pattern Yoshika had produced, but it buoyed Kairi the same way. "I probably shouldn't try to cast Holy while flying, but otherwise I'm good to go!"

Yoshika explained, "Okay, if it's your first time putting on a Striker Unit, it should try to let you know the basic controls. Do you feel anything?"

Kairi held a hand to her head and furrowed her brow. "Yeah, there are some impressions, but I'm having trouble making any sense of them..."

 _"Here, let me help."_ Namine used her power to metaphorically catch the new thoughts and memories, which were flitting against Kairi's mind like flies trying to get past a window, and sorted them out into something Kairi could use. As she did so, she told Yoshika, _"My name is Namine. I'm a part of Kairi who was split off into my own person a while ago. I came back to her later, but I'm still me."_

Lambda added, "Take our word for it, it's just too complicated to explain the whole situation. All you really need to know is that Namine has power over certain people's memories, but you and Hazama aren't on the list of people she can affect."

Yoshika replied, "Okay, that...makes sense, I guess? I was never very good at keeping track of complicated stuff."

"Like Lambda said, it's not something you need to worry about. Let's just continue..." Kairi pulled a lever on the harness, causing the bottom part of it to shoot forward along the floor and shove her out onto the runway at full speed, Striker Unit and all. "Aah! I don't know how to stop!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Over the Grassland..._

Yoshika threw her own lever and yelled ahead, " _Don't_ stop! Keep going! You've got to get going fast enough to take off!"

"O-okay!" Kairi grit her teeth and faced forward, trying to increase the unit's output while staying stable. She wobbled once, twice, and finally lifted higher into the air just as she ran out of runway to use. The magic circle below her faded away as she climbed way up. "Wow! I'm flying!"

Yoshika breezed past her with practiced ease. "Great! Now let's try turning!" She tilted one leg up and the other down, causing her to bank hard to the right. "Don't overdo it at first, or you'll spin out!"

"Right...no pressure or anything..." Kairi tentatively copied Yoshika's movements, managing a shallower turn. Now that she'd gotten over the initial surprise, she started to calm down a little, and found that controlling the Striker Unit was actually quite intuitive. After a few more turns, she felt like she'd gotten the hang of it.

"Wait for us!" Xion called up from the ground below. She summoned her Sonic Blade, set the sword hovering behind her back, and used the combined lift of the wings and her new rocket boots to shoot straight up. When the rockets cut off, Xion was still able to climb a little higher from the momentum and hang in midair at the same altitude as Kairi and Yoshika. Shorter rocket bursts let her maneuver whichever way she wanted. "This setup would be way more useful on the ground, but I'll make do."

Lambda and Hazama shot up into the air with their leg blades, showing off much finer control. "Okay, are we ready to go fight that boss?"

Yoshika led Kairi over to the others and showed her how to hover in one place by turning upright and bending slightly forward. "I think we're ready...oh, wait, I forgot to bring a gun!"

Kairi yelped, "A gun?!" Even after all the adventuring she'd done, the concept of a gun seemed more...real, and immediately dangerous, than a Keyblade.

"Well, of course! How would I have fought in the battles for Britannia and Romagna if I didn't have a gun? Although I admit I was really hesitant to actually use one at first...anyway, I'll be back in a moment! I'm sure there must be an armory somewhere in that base!" While the other girls tried to reconcile Yoshika's young and innocent appearance with her nonchalant admission that she was a veteran child soldier, the wayward Strike Witch zoomed back down to the Base to locate a weapon.

Hazama asked, "Show of hands, who wants to ditch Yoshika and go tackle the boss right now?" She raised her hand. "I feel like I'll throw up if I have to listen to her squeak much more."

Lambda choked up while trying to cover a laugh. "She's not _that_ bad...okay, she is. But you already asked her to help out, and if she can fight, that's as useful as teaching Kairi to fly."

Kairi shook her head at Hazama's proposal. "Let's definitely wait. I need a bit more time to practice, anyway." She did a few loops and turns, circling around the rest of the group.

 _"This is fun! Do a barrel roll!"_ Namine seemed to be enjoying the ride. Kairi giggled along with her and tried rolling, and managed to pull off a pretty slick barrel roll (aileron roll, actually, but neither she nor Namine knew that) that could help her dodge slightly to the side in combat.

Xion shrugged, carrying on the conversation with Hazama. "If Yoshika didn't squeak so much, I probably wouldn't be able to hear her at all, between the wind and the engine noises."

Lambda perked up suddenly. "Proximity alert. There's still someone else up here!" She swiveled around in midair and pointed at a dark object flying toward the group at high speed.

"Is it an enemy?" Xion aimed at it with her arm cannon.

"I'm not sure..."

Lambda had no more time to theorize, because the mysterious entity had reached the party, seeming to teleport the last fifty meters of distance. Now that it was closer, they could see it had a clear resemblance to Yoshika or another Striker-wearing witch, but it was made entirely out of some kind of pitch-black metal. A helmet that looked like rigid hair obscured its "face" while the design of its torso and tubular arms made it seem to be wearing a long sweater (including a swell to indicate breasts, for some reason), all made out of the same metal. Angular patches of some blue, shiny material marked its otherwise completely black shell on its animal-like ears and on the wings of its Striker Unit-like legs, and red hexagons glowed on the ends of its "sleeves". It hung there in midair without any visible method of propulsion, regarding the group with its eyeless face.

"Scanning...target is a sentient, non-organic life form. Species unknown. Threat level: B, due to below-average defenses. What we're looking at is some kind of brittle, armored shell around a tiny core in its chest. If we have to fight it, we'll have to get through the armor to find and hit that core. Detected weapon systems include..."

The entity interrupted Lambda's report with a strange, reverberating sound, somewhere between metal scraping against wire and some kind of quasi-organic animal whining. It moved back in midair a bit, seeming to recognize that Lambda viewed it as a threat.

Lambda held her head. "What...my radio? It's trying to communicate, but it's on every channel at once. Demodulating...decoding...almost got it...there! I'll put it on my external speaker."

A slightly distorted, emotionless version of Lambda's voice came from inside her throat, independent from her mouth. _"Unknown creatures, respond if this communication attempt is successful."_

"Yes, we understand you now. Who or what are you, anyway?" Lambda spoke out loud and sent the same message via radio, to be sure the entity understood.

 _"This unit is Neuroi Witch-type special unit 0003. Communication with Hive 2953 was lost approximately 36,000 standard seconds ago. The Hive is compromised by unknown hostiles. This unit has no option but to request aid from local life-forms."_

Lambda nodded. "So you're one of the 'Neuroi' that Yoshika was talking about...here, I'm sending you some standard unit conversions to help simplify communications. That way, you can say '10 hours' instead of '36,000 seconds'."

The "Neuroi" responded over the radio, but remained unnervingly motionless. _"Data acquired."_

Hazama recalled, "Yoshika said she was fighting against the Neuroi, right? Won't it cause a scene when she gets back here, if we're hanging out and chatting with one?"

Xion shrugged. "Maybe, but I bet this Hive it's talking about is the boss we're looking for."

The Neuroi actually moved in response to that name, raising its head and moving backward a bit. So at least it could hear and understand spoken words as easily as radio transmissions. _"Term recognized: Yoshika. Data records found in inter-Hive database. Full designation, 'Yoshika Miyafuji.' Selected by Hive 2810 as the original template for Witch-type Neuroi units. Species: human. Aligned with hostile factions resisting attempts by Hive 2810 and Hive 3001 to harvest planetary energy and materials. Considered extremely dangerous if threatened, but records indicate that peaceful contact was made between Yoshika Miyafuji and Hive 2810. Attention: all memory records will auto-delete in 14 hours, unless contact with Hive 2953 is re-established. Replaying relevant record..."_

A holographic screen sprung up in front of the Neuroi, showing a memory from a different world, from the viewpoint of a different but identical-looking Witch-type Neuroi that flew around and played with Yoshika for a few minutes, then later led her back to its Hive to show her some kind of conspiracy of humans experimenting on Neuroi cores.

 _"Conclusion: in abnormal circumstances such as the current emergency, Yoshika Miyafuji is an acceptable resource or ally."_

Xion floated closer to Kairi and murmured, "I feel like, if we keep hanging around this Neuroi, it'll start growing a heart of its own, like Tron did."

Kairi raised an eyebrow. "Like who did?"

Namine got the reference, however. _"That's a good point, Xion. Well, it can't be a bad thing, can it?"_

Lambda nodded. "I'm certainly in favor." She addressed the Neuroi: "To start out, from now on, I'm going to call you 'Three'. It's a lot easier to say than 'Neuroi Witch-type special unit 0003'. One thing you ought to know about humans and other human-like intelligent life is that we like short and simple concepts. Also, names are important. In fact, you might want to come up with an even better name for yourself one day."

 _"Acknowledged. This unit is assigned temporary self-designation 'Three'."_

Lambda smiled. "Good. Now, Three, about the Hive, you said it was attacked by something else and you lost contact? What's that all about?"

Three explained, _"All Neuroi units follow orders from the Hive that created them. All Hives follow orders from the central Neuroi consciousness, although the Neuroi hierarchy above the Hive level is irrelevant to the current emergency. If a Hive is destroyed, all Neuroi units under its command are also destroyed. This unit, Three, is no longer connected to its creator, Hive 2953, due to the unknown hostiles corrupting and controlling it. All other Neuroi units on this planet were inside or near the Hive during the attack 10 hours ago, and were corrupted through their connection to the Hive. Due to its assignment to reconnaissance of this unfamiliar planet, Three was the only unit far enough away to cut communications in time to avoid corruption."_

Hazama tilted her head and guessed, "So you want us to save your Hive so you can restore your connection, is that right?"

 _"Affirmative. However, due to having cut its connection from the Hive voluntarily, Three will be designated as a defector and marked for destruction by other Neuroi once the Hive's normal functions resume."_

Xion gasped. "So they'll kill you for breaking the rules...but you still want to save them? That's...actually kind of admirable."

Kairi clenched a fist. "Well, you've convinced me. Let's go save the Hive, then! The target we're looking for is probably the thing possessing it, not the Hive itself."

 _"It wouldn't be the first time a Heartless has possessed something inorganic,"_ Namine agreed.

"Hey! Wait for meee!" Yoshika squealed as she rejoined the group, cradling a sizable machine gun that looked even bigger compared to her tiny arms. "I've got my gun, and - wait, is that...? It's a Neuroi that looks like a witch! I made friends with one of those once!"

 _"Affirmative. Yoshika Miyafuji made non-hostile contact with Neuroi Witch-type special prototype unit 0000. This unit is Neuroi Witch-type special unit 0003, temporarily designated 'Three'. Your allies have agreed to provide assistance to purge unknown hostiles from Hive 2810."_

Yoshika took a moment to puzzle through all the long words. "Sooo...you're a different Neuroi, but you knew the one that was my friend, and your Hive needs our help. Okay, let's go! I always thought the best way to stop the Neuroi from attacking humanity was to be friends with them, anyway, so I'll keep taking every chance I get!"

Hazama chuckled. "It's almost nostalgic having someone around that relies so heavily on robo-speak. We were headed that way anyway, but I'll let Three here tag along."

Xion punched the air with her free fist. "Then let's go! Sonic Blade!" She got a head-start by using her wings' eponymous special move to launch herself forward.

Lambda called after her, "Xion, that's the wrong way! The target's _that_ way!"

Xion yelled back, "What...say? Lam...I can't...you...!" She'd launched herself right out of earshot.

"Oh, right!" Yoshika fumbled in her shirt for a moment. "I brought radios!" She brought out a few metal discs with stars printed on them. "Witches use these to talk to each other while flying. Lambda doesn't seem to need one, but I do. Here, Kairi, you can have one, too."

"Thanks." Kairi fit the little device in her ear. _"Can you hear me?"_

 _"Loud and clear!"_ Lambda replied. "Hazama, you should have an internal radio, too, right? I'll get Xion on the line as well. Three, you can use this channel as well if you use the translation package I'm sending you."

Three replied over the radio. _"Acknowledged. Data received."_

Xion joined the channel as she realigned herself for another lunge. _"Whoops! I'll get it right this time! Sonic Blade!"_

Kairi leaned forward and got moving. _"Alright, let's catch up to her and fly in formation. At this rate, we'll be done in no time!"_

Xion groaned, _"You do know that by saying that, you've just doomed us to some kind of setback, right?"_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Over the Mountains..._

 _"What do you mean...oh, right, it must be an anime thing."_ Kairi nodded; she'd noticed a similar trend in her games. _"Well, whatever happens, dealing with it would still be faster than getting through those mountains on foot."_

She referred to the mountains the group was passing over at that moment. This world was laid out in concentric rings of bland landscapes - the Base was in the middle of the Grasslands, which were surrounded by the impassable, yet uniformly-placed Mountains, which were in turn surrounded by the Ocean, which stretched out to the horizon with nary an island in sight. The group's target was somewhere out over the Ocean. Each ring was miles wide, and the terrain of the Mountains was too difficult to cover on foot, but with their new, world-specific flight abilities, the team could travel the radius of the world in just a few minutes.

Xion pointed out, _"It's not just anime; Donald had to deal with this fate-tempting problem from Sora."_

 _"We should watch out,"_ Yoshika put in. _"We don't know how far the possessed Neuroi have spread, and there might even be other people being brought here from other worlds besides mine."_

Namine called, _"I don't see any people, but here come some Heartless!"_ Luckily, her voice could be picked up by Kairi's radio. _"Lots of them are coming up from below!"_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Defeat all of the Heartless!_

Lambda looked down at the mountains below and scanned the incoming threats. " _We've got ten Aeroplanes and thirty Wyverns. The Wyverns are grouped into three squads of ten, each led by an additional Tailbunker. The Tailbunkers are each a B-class threat, while the others are collectively C-class. The Aeroplanes and Tailbunkers have projectile attacks._"

 _"Doesn't sound too tough,"_ Kairi replied, then slapped her forehead. _"Argh, I've got to stop saying things like that!"_

Yoshika asked, _"So these things are 'Heartless?'"_

Xion replied, _"Yep, and there are a lot of other types to see. Shoot 'em before they take your heart and turn you into one of them!"_ She fired a bolt from her Arm Cannon, but missed the fast-moving targets.

 _"They can do that?!"_

 _"Sure, if you suck at fighting back."_ Hazama launched some spikes, managing to nail the head of one of the Aeroplanes. _"See? They break easily. They keep coming back later unless you use a Keyblade, but that gun of yours can certainly get them off our backs."_

Kairi tried to get a Heartless in her sights to cast a spell. _"Something's off about this. The Wyverns are all flying in formation...whoa!"_

The three squads of Wyverns had been circling the heroines, and all thirty of them suddenly rammed inward with spiraling tackles from every direction. Kairi chopped a wing off one as she dodged, but another one rammed right into her.

 _"This is bad! The Heartless never had such good teamwork before!"_ Lambda repelled a tackle with her Petal Blades, then summoned two basic Options to return fire, but she had to dodge another tackle and an Aeroplane's machine guns.

Three's legs were entirely destroyed by another Wyvern, but its core was safe in its torso, and it responded by blasting the Heartless with red beams from its hands. Three's legs regenerated in seconds, regrowing the broken parts of its shell as the Heartless banked around for another pass. _"Warning. High probability that this unit will be destroyed if current tactics continue."_

 _"I'll defend you, Three!"_ Yoshika rushed over to Three and held her hands out against another swoop, generating a blue barrier that looked like an intricate magic circle. _"I won't let them get you! There's no way these Heartless can break my shield!"_

Kairi veered away from the group. _"We've got to split up and force them to break this pattern! Lambda, Hazama, take down the Aeroplanes. Yoshika, you keep defending Three - keep moving and try to keep the attention of the Wyverns. Xion, you're with me. We're going to take down those Tailbunkers; there must be a reason they haven't attacked yet."_

Lambda reported, _"Radio transmissions and traces of Darkness detected. It looks like you're right; the Tailbunkers are getting orders from the corrupted Hive, then following them by bossing around the other Heartless because they're the strongest. Take down the leaders, and their formation will fall apart. Now terminating assigned targets."_ She dove under another Wyvern to get close to two of the Aeroplanes, then peppered them with shots from her Options.

Hazama chased down an Aeroplane from behind, then cut off its escape by sending Ouroboros ahead of it. Chomp! _"I've gotta hand it to you, Kairi; this is a pretty good plan for your first time taking your job as team leader seriously. I don't know why you kept treating this like a democracy."_

Kairi paused for a moment, then got back to hacking away at a Tailbunker's wings. _"Wait, why am I the leader? I thought we were all just friends. Bind!"_ By limiting the spell area to snag only the Tailbunker's spiked, club-like tail, Kairi bypassed its status resistance and successfully bound it in place. _"Xion! It's all yours!"_

Xion answered, _"That. You're the leader because you can get your people where they need to be. Sonic Blade!"_ She blasted through the Tailbunker with a speedy lunge, destroying it. A shot from her Arm Cannon got the attention of a second Tailbunker, which foolishly drew close.

 _"I think you're a good leader, Kairi. I'm sure Commander Minna would agree."_ Yoshika fired her machine gun at an incoming swarm of Wyverns, destroying all but four of them. The survivors bounced off her barrier and were shot down by Three's beams.

 _"Current tactics have greatly increased probability of success."_ Three shot down another Aeroplane.

Lambda surrounded three Aeroplanes alongside Hazama and Ouroboros. _"The Heartless may have some teamwork, but it's no match for ours!"_

 _"This is pretty fun!"_ Xion sliced at the Tailbunker with her ScimitArs, then destroyed it with a point-blank charged shot from her Arm Cannon. The giant, blue ball of plasma kept going and destroyed the last two Aeroplanes. " _Ragnarok!_ " Before heading to attack the last Tailbunker, she summoned Ouroboros and fired a swarm of homing magic bolts that decimated another swarm of Wyverns.

 _"Gravity Option!"_ Now that the Aeroplanes were defeated, Lambda transformed one of her Options into her new satellite-shaped variant, then sent it into the last swarm of Wyverns. As the Heartless bumbled into the purple column of magic surrounding the Gravity Option, they plunged out of the sky and crashed into the rocky mountains below.

 _"Just one left!"_ The last Tailbunker made another surprisingly intelligent move and turned away to retreat from the battle. Kairi rushed toward it, but it vanished. The redhead shrugged and dismissed her Keyblade. _"I guess that means we win! Great work, everyone!"_

Xion fired a celebratory plasma shot into the air. _"Go, Team Kairi!"_

Hazama chuckled. _"Is that what we're calling ourselves now? Eh, why the hell not?"_

Kairi sighed. _"I suppose it saves me the trouble of trying to come up with an acronym out of our names or something. I almost thought of one, but then Hazama joined."_

Lambda pointed out, _"This way certainly rolls off the tongue well enough. It's a little early to celebrate, though. We're only halfway to the target."_

Three put in, _"The Hive is defended by several corrupted Neuroi units, which should be destroyed before attempting to approach the Hive itself. Confirmed that these Heartless had inferior offensive and defensive capabilities compared to standard Neuroi units."_

Namine replied, _"Even so, we're all getting stronger, too. Even you, Three. Did you notice your beams became stronger after Yoshika moved to defend you?"_

 _"Checking records...confirmed. Magic power conversion efficiency increased by 20%. Cause unknown."_

Namine told it, _"It's because you've started growing a heart of your own, Three. A heart is what lets you experience emotions and bonds with other people. There's also a purely practical benefit: you need to have a heart to generate your own mana, which would help the Neuroi not need to invade planets."_

 _"...Acknowledged. This unit...I will attempt to present this information to the central Neuroi consciousness, pending purge of hostiles from Hive 2953. Chance of success: minimal, but..."_

Lambda finished, _"...But you still want to try. I understand. That desire to help others is why Yoshika protected you, and now you want to pay it forward. That's how hearts grow."_

Hazama chuckled. _"Aw, they grow up so fast! Before you do any of that, though there's still the little issue of those giant alien planes up ahead."_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Over the Ocean..._

The "giant alien planes" Hazama referred to were definitely corrupted Neuroi. There were five of them; each was formed of blocky arrangements of black and purple hexagons in the vague shape of a fighter jet, and each was surrounded by a faint cloud of Darkness. Purple blobs clung to various spots on their hulls, surrounded by vein-like lines of Darkness. The Neuroi were several times larger than the human aircraft they mimicked, but also moved much slower. As they reacted to Team Kairi's approach by turning towards the party, they made a similar sound to the one Three made earlier, but at a much lower pitch.

Lambda scanned the enemy. _"Scanning...aerial Neuroi units analyzed. Individual threat level: B. Capable of firing Darkness-corrupted beam attacks from purple armor sections. Each Neuroi is covered in several Shadow Blobs; destroying these may disrupt the Heartless' corrupting influence. The Neuroi itself can only be destroyed by breaking through its armor and attacking the core. Cores located; sending data to allied HUD displays."_

A red dot appeared on each of the Neuroi in Xion's and Hazama's vision, indicating the location of the core. Hazama smirked. _"How convenient!"_

Xion summoned all of her weapons and began charging her Arm Cannon. _"Sure is, but I'd rather try to free them before destroying them."_

Kairi summoned her Keyblade. _"It's worth a shot! Head for the closest one; try and keep it between us and the other four."_

Team Kairi zoomed into battle...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: Stopping here to get something posted before video games eat my life in December. There are still a few surprises to look forward to in the latter half of this Training World arc, but don't hold your breath...you'll need it to play/squee over Super Smash Bros. Ultimate._

 _Kingdom Hearts III is so...close...! I'm not going to be able to finish this story before it comes out, which is probably for the best if this crossover continues into yet another book._


	11. Dream Team

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 11: Dream Team**

 **-"Commit It To Memory."-**

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: This chapter was brought to you in spite of the video games_ Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Kirby Star Allies _, and_ Shining Resonance Refrain _, all of which tried their hardest to distract me._

 _When we last saw Team Kairi, they were about to enter the second phase of an airborne gauntlet in Training World 4: Sky of Battle. Before we get back to that, though, here's a quick change in perspective..._

 _Disclaimer: Nope, I still don't own_ Kingdom Hearts, BlazBlue, _or_ Strike Witches. _I'm still making no profit, I still don't intend to infringe on any copyrights._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A few hours/weeks ago..._

 _[The Realm Between] Twilight Town: Station Tower...?_

Axel returned to awareness for the first time in...um, a day, maybe? Well, how was he supposed to know? Wasn't he supposed to be dead, terminated, eliminated, or at least somewhere in that general zone of stopped-existing? Well, whatever had happened, the sea salt ice cream bar that had somehow ended up in his hand was as tasty as ever. Now if only he could get some peace and quiet...

 _"Hey. Hey. Hey, Axel! Axel! C'mon, I'm supposed to be the zombie, remember?"_

"Ergh...whuh?" Axel finally cracked his emerald eyes open to see, "Roxas! You're back? How?!"

Roxas shrugged. "Because of Lambda's Observation, Namine's memory powers, Kairi and Sora generally breaking the rules of everything...take your pick. What matters is that _you're_ not back yet. You promised you'd always be there to bring us back, right?"

Axel groaned. "I get it, I get it. Seems like you grew an attitude along with that heart. So, if you came back with help from all those other people, how am I supposed to come back? I'm pretty sure I'm on Kairi's bad side, for starters."

Roxas shook his head. "You probably should be, but I don't think Kairi even _has_ a bad side. But I'll be the one bringing you back, with my training as an Observer...and a little help from this." He held up a crayon drawing of Axel and himself in their Organization coats. "Namine drew this a while ago while she was fixing Sora's memories. It has some of my memories of you tied to it, so I used it to help Observe you. You were already going to come back anyway, but it might have taken a while since we didn't really spend that much time together. I've been told the connections between hearts are supposed to help."

Roxas turned away and walked off the Station Tower balcony, stepping across thin air much like Xion had once done. He called over his shoulder, "Once you get back, finish whatever business you might have in Radiant Garden, then come find Merlin at The Mysterious Tower; he'll help you enter the place where I'm training with Xion, Lambda, and Kairi. There, I'll transfer the primary Observer position from me to you, which will help stabilize both of us. Since you were supposed to be alive anyway, you won't need my help staying that way. At least, according to Merlin, who's been training me. Play nice with Mickey's group, and you might even get a Keyblade out of the deal! Did you catch all of that?"

Axel grinned - that deal couldn't have been any sweeter even if Roxas passed him another ice cream bar. "Consider it memorized! With so many pleasant surprises waiting for me, why would I ever want to stay asleep?"

The world around him grew brighter and brighter...

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[The Realm of Light] Radiant Garden: Ansem's Study..._

Axel awoke in a much less comfortable position, lying on the cold, metal floor of Ansem's computer room. "Right...this is where it happened." He pushed himself up and took a peek at his reflection in the glass separating this room from the Heartless Manufactory downstairs, noting that the teardrop-shaped tattoos under his eyes had vanished, though he looked just like he always had in every other way, including the Black Coat he was wearing. Axel - no, _Lea_ \- whispered to himself, "I'm whole again. But what about the others?"

Turning around, he saw the collapsed forms of four of Ansem the Wise's former apprentices: Dilan, Even, Aeleus, and Ienzo - no longer Xaldin, Vexen, Lexaeus, and Zexion. Lea gulped in apprehension. "Just my luck that I'd wake up next to the two guys I personally backstabbed." It made sense; they had all been here, right in this room, when they lost their hearts in the first place. But if that was the case, where were Ansem's other two apprentices: Xehanort and Braig? And...Isa? Shouldn't they be here, too?

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A far-off memory that's like a scattered dream..._

"Lea, we should go back. We'll be in serious trouble if they catch us sneaking this far into the castle." Lea's blue-haired and unfortunately sane friend glanced at shadowy, pipe-filled corners, expecting guards to jump out and arrest them both.

"C'mon, Isa, we're so close! Don't you wanna see your idol in person?" Lea was referring to Xehanort: the cool, strong, smart, attractive, and overall suspiciously-too-perfect star pupil of Ansem the Wise. Isa had read one of Xehanort's published papers once, and ever since then, Lea's days had been filled with "Xehanort theorized" this, "Xehanort discovered" that, and "Xehanort kicked the butt of" the other guy. Sure, all of those claims were true, but did Isa have to keep bringing up every new bit of information?

At least it helped Lea finally convince Isa to help him sneak into the castle again, after their botched attempt a couple months prior got them literally thrown out the door. This way, Isa could watch Xehanort at work firsthand. As for Lea, he was really just being nosy. He wanted to see what crazy experiments kept the king down in his study all the time and made him miss the last two scheduled town meetings and events.

In the end, although they avoided the guards, Lea and Isa didn't get to see much of Ansem's research or experimental processes. Just the results: a tidal wave of dark monsters bursting out from beneath the castle's basement. The castle's secret basement containing Ansem's study was hard enough to find and sneak into, but who knew it had its _own_ secret basement that was hiding a monster factory? It hardly mattered to Radiant Garden's sun- and moon-themed delinquents; all they knew was that they definitely needed to get back those sparkly pink things that the monsters had ripped out of their chests. Well, maybe after a nap...

...They woke up as Nobodies in a completely different city. They joined Organization XIII, headed by Xehanort's own Nobody, Xemnas, and dedicated themselves to climbing the group's hierarchy to find out just what Xehanort had done that day.

However, both of them lost sight of their original goal somewhere along the way, and the rest was history.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Back in the present..._

Speaking of history, Lea knew he should get out of here before the others woke up - especially Even and Ienzo, who would now be capable of holding grudges for the brutal murders they'd suffered at Axel's hands.

Following Roxas' directions, Lea snapped his fingers to create a Dark Corridor to The Mysterious Tower to meet Merlin, but not much happened aside from a few wisps of smoke where he wanted the Corridor to appear. He did get this _feeling_ from the Darkness, though. Like, _No! I don't wanna! You can't make me!_

Of course, Lea wasn't going to allow that kind of back-sass from his own feelings just because he finally had them again. He twisted his hand around and wrangled the Darkness into compliance, then rushed through the new Corridor before any more complications could arise.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Mysterious Tower: Sorcerer's Loft..._

Lea stumbled out of the Corridor, collapsed it behind him, and double-checked that all his limbs were intact and properly positioned. Holy smokes, those things were way harder to traverse with a functioning heart! How did Riku manage it so often?

"More troubles...?" Lea finally got a good look around the room. Apart from some artifacts with appropriately arcane appearances, this architectural anomaly's apex also accommodated an aged and annoyed arcane/astrological academic. "Why have you appeared before us now, Ax...no. It appears you have been recompleted. What is your name, and why have you come here? I certainly have my hypotheses, but I have often failed to predict your actions in the past."

Lea grinned. At least the old man seemed to be up to speed, and sharp enough to notice the missing tattoos. "Whoa, nice catch! My name's Lea - got it memorized? As for why I'm here, Roxas asked me to come, so here I am. I suppose you're Merlin, then?"

"Hmph. You are mistaken; Merlin is presently in that room over there. I am Yen Sid, the Master of this tower and a former Keyblade Master. Forgive me, but I believe you should make some effort to prove your intentions are benign before I allow you to meet with Roxas. And yes, I _can_ stop you if I must." Yen Sid waved a hand and conjured a ghostly, blue barrier over the door to the changing room, thoroughly warding that room against teleportation, physical damage, and fire. Especially fire. A similar shield covered the sorcerer's chair, which he sank back into with a smug smile.

Lea slumped over. "Fine, fine. Roxas said to play nice, after all. What do you need me to do?"

Yen Sid affixed him with a dire stare. "King Mickey was here until shortly before your arrival, but he has left to confront the evil fairy Maleficent, who has kidnapped Queen Minnie and now holds the Queen hostage in her own Disney Castle." Yen Sid then smiled knowingly. "Maleficent's letter warned Mickey to arrive alone or with his 'pathetic retainers' only, but she wrote nothing about sending reinforcements afterward. Go, and see to it that Minnie is rescued and Maleficent is thwarted. You should be able to reach Disney Castle through a Dark Corridor, since Maleficent did the same."

Lea grinned. "Sure thing. Be back in a snap!" He opened another Dark Corridor. He anticipated even greater trouble than before, what with that Cornerstone...of Light? Was that what it was called? Anyway, even if it was apparently broken, it wouldn't be as easy to enter Disney Castle as any other world. Luckily, Lea was able to sense what was going on on the other side of the Corridor, and...bingo! A perfect last-minute rescue opportunity! He summoned one of his chakrams and threw it through the Corridor ahead of him, controlling it with basic armakinesis to intercept Maleficent's attack on the other side. "Phew, all of that still works! Okay, gotta be cool..." Axel strode through the Corridor, making sure not to outwardly show any discomfort from the journey.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Disney Castle: Library..._

"Maleficent...you lose!" King Mickey brandished his Keyblade, **Star Seeker** , in the direction of Pete and Maleficent. Meanwhile, Donald and Goofy defended Queen Minnie with their trusty staff and shield.

Pete pointed sideways (towards stage left, the traditional villainous escape route for getting offscreen and out of danger in a hurry). "Maleficent, I hate to say it, but I think the pipsqueak's right! We'd better skedaddle!"

Maleficent scowled, but had to admit she'd been outplayed. "I will retreat for now, but rest assured that when I return, this castle and its invaluable data shall be MINE!" Next time, more attention would be paid to the possibility of last-minute interference from unknown parties. Perhaps it was too arrogant of her not to cordon this room off with a Dark Wall. For now, Maleficent opened a Dark Corridor (near the stage left exit) with a sweep of her hand and stalked through it.

"Maleficent, w-wait for me!" Pete hurried after her, and the Corridor closed.

Mickey relaxed and dismissed his Keyblade. "That was too close. Still, I never expected _you_ to save us..." He turned to regard, "...Axel."

Axel - er, Lea - belatedly realized that he'd be dealing with a lot of accidental misnaming from now on. With a sigh, he corrected, "'Axel'? Please. My name is Lea. Got it memorized?"

Mickey nodded, then frowned seriously...er, smiled slightly less than usual while making angry eyebrows. "You used the Darkness to get here? That was reckless."

Lea shrugged. "Figured that out for myself, thanks. Still, it worked, didn't it? Now maybe Yen Sid will believe me when I get back. I have a few things to ask him..."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[The Training Worlds] Sky of Battle: Over the Ocean..._

 _Stop the Possessed Neuroi!_

While flying toward the Neuroi, Yoshika took the lead and created an intricate magic circle as a shield. This turned out to be a smart move, because the closest Neuroi reacted by firing a salvo of purple beams that faded to black in the middle from all the purple hexagons on its shell. After bending sharply in midair to fly directly at the newcomers, a dozen of these beams splashed against Yoshika's shield and bent off to all sides, missing Team Kairi completely and merely splashing into the water below. Yoshika yelled, " _Everyone stay behind me!_ "

" _That's no good,_ " Kairi replied. " _The rest of us need to get into arm's reach to fight those things._ "

" _Heh, speak for yourself!_ " Hazama smirked as she broke formation, wrapping Ouroboros around herself to deflect more beams. A beam pushed her backward slightly, but didn't break her barrier. She raised her arms and fired a few spikes at a shallow angle to the Neuroi's shell. The spikes ripped through a Shadow Blob on the back of the Neuroi and bounced through a second blob on its wing before falling into the ocean. Ten seconds later, Hazama's guns flashed green to indicate that her spike supply had regenerated.

" _I can take a few hits, too._ " Xion boosted over Yoshika and took aim with her Arm Cannon, ignoring a beam that splashed against her defense screen. " _It'd take at least five more of those to even put a dent in my shield!_ " She fired a fully-charged, blue plasma shot, smashing another Shadow Blob and most of the possessed Neuroi's right wing.

Unfortunately, the Neuroi retaliated by firing all its beams while the damaged wing regenerated. Each beam curved in midair to intersect at a point directly above the Neuroi, gathering into a ball of black and purple energy that finally fired at Xion as a much larger beam. Xion took a direct hit, and when she tried to push against the attack, her defense screen shattered into red wireframe fragments. She barely managed to boost to the side before being hit directly as the beam screamed out into the distance. " _Okay, point taken! Yoshika, I need cover!_ "

Yoshika quickly gained altitude to get Xion back behind her shield. " _You can count on me! Three, you stay close to me, too!_ "

" _Acknowledged._ " The team's Neuroi ally fired a few red beams through Yoshika's one-way shield as they moved to cover Xion, managing to burn away a Shadow Blob on the Neuroi's tail fin. " _One Shadow Blob remains attached to target. Recommend an attack from below._ "

Lambda and Kairi were left to dodge more beams by themselves, which they were thankfully agile enough to manage with barrel rolls and air dashes. However, Lambda had had enough of being the defenseless one. " _Custom Option design finalized. Protect Option, standing by._ "

Lambda's new Option appeared in a white flash, taking the form of a floating, slate-gray escutcheon - a medieval knight's shield designed to bear a coat of arms. This one had Lambda's personal Ars Magus seal emblazoned in green paint on the front, identical to Elysium's Keychain. A barrier of interlocked, transparent hexagons sprang into existence around the Option, enclosing Kairi and Lambda in a protective bubble. A Neuroi beam splashed off the new barrier with no effect.

" _Now_ _that's_ _a useful Option! Let's go get that last blob, Lambda!"_ Kairi and Lambda swooped underneath the Neuroi side-by-side, watching as the next Neuroi in line fruitlessly added its firepower to the assault on Lambda's shield. " _Firaga!_ " Kairi launched the strongest Fire spell she could muster at the Shadow Blob clinging to the center of their current target's underside...but the fireball was blocked by the inside of the Protect Option's barrier, harmlessly dissipating along the transparent surface. " _That's...less useful._ "

Lambda shrugged. " _No problem. Cast again in three...two...one...Firaga!_ " As Lambda pointed her Keyblade at the target and launched her own Firaga spell in tandem with Kairi, her Option's barrier vanished for a moment, allowing her and Kairi's spells to destroy the target before the barrier reappeared. " _That's all of the Shadow Blobs...but it doesn't look like the Neuroi was freed from possession._ "

Xion frowned. " _Drat. The blobs must have been a side effect, not the cause. I guess that just leaves destroying them until we can take down the boss._ " Then she smirked. " _Oh well; I've been waiting for a chance to use_ _this_ _,_ _anyway!_ " Using the targeting data Lambda had sent her to find the quickest path to the core, Xion summoned a new weapon: a massive orange warhammer as tall as Xion herself, with concentric circles marked on the flat face of the hammerhead. " _Check out my newest weapon: I call it_ _Impact_!"

With a long yell, Xion dropped into a booster-aided dive, slamming her new hammer down onto the armor blocking the Neuroi's core. A circular shockwave radiated out from the point of impact with a loud _BANG_ sound, smashing more armor as it went and leaving the Neuroi's core wide open.

The Neuroi's core was a red, twelve-sided crystal that shone with its own crimson light...but that light was swallowed up by the cloud-like _Possessor_ Heartless engulfing it. Xion smirked and reported, " _I've found the source of the possession! I remember how Sora handled these little guys..._ " She dismissed Impact and summoned her Keyblade, which hovered in front of her left hand and fired a Release beam. The Possessor was shunted aside, allowing Xion's flying Keyblade to cut through it. " _Nailed it! This Neuroi should be free now!_ "

Just as she thought, the purple hexagons on the Neuroi's shell turned red all at once. The shell had already almost finished repairing the damage from Impact, and the newly freed Neuroi turned around in midair to fire a volley of bright red beams at the next possessed Neuroi in line.

Yoshika gasped. " _Uh-oh, it'll destroy its allies if it keeps this up! Three, can you tell it to stop so we can free the others?_ "

Three replied with a faintly regretful tone, " _Negative. My request to open communications was refused. However, that Neuroi unit is no longer targeting us._ "

" _Let's just try and save the others as fast as we can, then,_ " Kairi decided. " _At least the other possessed Neuroi will be distracted, and now we know that we don't need to waste time on the Shadow Blobs. Go straight for the_ _Possessors_ _around their cores!_ "

Lambda scanned ahead. " _Scanning...All enemy Neuroi cores located. Transmitting data...done!_ "

Hazama smirked and took Xion's free hand. " _We'll clean these guys up in no time! C'mon, Xion, I'll clear a path._ " The two of them boosted ahead, leaving Lambda and Yoshika to catch up while defending Kairi and Three.

Releasing and attacking the Possessor first caused any Shadow Blobs on the possessed Neuroi to vanish, making the next part of the fight nearly effortless. Working together, Team Kairi managed to free all but one other Neuroi, which was destroyed by the first one they'd saved. Now that there were no more possessed Neuroi in the vicinity, Three tried to contact its four former allies again: it provided a status report, its most recent memory records, and an outline of the plan to save Hive 2953. Its projected chances of success were much higher now that it had seen its human (and mostly-humanoid) allies discover a working method to save possessed Neuroi from the Heartless.

This time, Three received a reply. "... _Acknowledged. Namine, these Neuroi have agreed to pass along your information regarding the 'heart' and its benefits of self-sustained magic power generation. However, they cannot help us battle Hive 2953._ "

Namine replied as the team returned to flying in formation, " _That's great news, Three! Our plan still works with or without them, and the future of the Neuroi race is looking brighter than ever._ "

" _Affirmative. This outcome is far superior to all of my previous estimates._ " Three bobbed up and down in midair excitedly, visibly emoting for the first time ever.

Hazama pointed out, " _Not to kill the mood or anything, but we still have to actually stop the Hive. Where is it, anyw... Wait, is_ _that_ _it?! It's huge!_ "

Visible on the horizon was a heavy storm cloud shaped like an upside-down funnel. Purple lightning surged through it in random arcs, and pairs of giant yellow Heartless eyes formed and vanished from random parts of the cloud.

Three replied, " _Negative. That cloud is merely a defense mechanism that surrounds each Hive. It is a swarm of nanomachines that defends the Hive from hostiles, counterattacks with electrical discharges, and gathers ambient magic power to transfer back to the central Neuroi consciousness, along with raw materials to create new Neuroi. However, the Heartless have corrupted the cloud itself and possessed the Hive inside._ "

Kairi nodded. " _Then we have to clear away that cloud and the..._ _Gigas Possessor_ _inside it first. Any ideas?_ "

Lambda replied, " _I've got one, but I'll need to get a bit closer._ "

Xion summoned most of her weapons. " _Then let's go, everyone!_ "

" _Ready!_ " Yoshika led the charge again, keeping her shield up to defend the group against any nasty surprises.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Save Neuroi Hive 2953 from the Gigas Possessor!_

Lambda gestured to stop when the group was almost beneath the shadow cast by the cloud's edge. " _Alright, here I go! HOLY...!_ "Lambda thrust Elysium skyward and called down a beam of blue-white Light from the sky with the same powerful spell Kairi had used in Lotus Academy, slamming straight into the tip of the inverted funnel cloud...only for the beam to splash out to the sides, doing no more damage than the deflected Neuroi beams from before. On top of that, Lambda faltered in midair, forcing Kairi to catch her. The Protect Option sputtered out of existence, but Yoshika moved to cover them.

Lambda muttered without using her radio, "Holy... *Huff, huff...* Smokes... That spell takes _way_ more Light than I was expecting! I managed to match your power output, Kairi, but it looks like it didn't do any good. Now I'm completely out of mana, my Light's almost burnt out, and my Options won't work again until I rest a bit...we need a new plan."

" _Plan B, coming right up! Look out below!_ " Xion boosted up above the cloud, watching the futile crackling of lightning that could only strike downward or sideways, and summoned her Final Weapon. With a grin, she let the massive sword drop...only for it to _bounce_ off the cloud and dissolve into golden flakes. " _You're_ _kidding_ _me! Where are we going to get more firepower than_ _that_ _?_ "

A new, male voice suddenly crackled over their radios. _"Did somebody say 'MORE FIREPOWER?!'"_

A propeller-driven biplane buzzed into view from behind them. Behind the open cockpit sat a man in a Black Coat with his hood down, showing off a mass of long, spiky, flame-red hair, emerald eyes, and a cocky grin. " _Make way! Comin' through!_ " He rammed his biplane into the Hive's cloud cover and set off a _MASSIVE_ blast of intense fire at the moment of impact, creating a much larger explosion than the one Axel made with his apparent sacrifice before.

The cloud was blown away by the explosion, revealing an enormous Neuroi shell shaped like a triangular pyramid, oriented upside-down from the conical cloud that once covered it. Each face of the pyramid had a single large spot in the middle devoted to the purple beam-firing hexagon type, and each spot was surrounded by three flexible armored tendrils tipped with more beam emitters. Meanwhile, the scattered cloud condensed into the _Gigas Possessor_ , which had no features except vaguely spiky protrusions sticking out of the cloud, two big yellow eyes, and a jagged red mouth floating in the smoke.

" _Haven't had enough yet? Take this!_ " Even as he fell upside-down out of his destroyed biplane, the girls' apparent savior summoned his familiar chakrams, held them in front of his chest at arm's length, and blasted a huge beam of fire from them, throwing himself backwards and tearing the Gigas Possessor apart again. This time, the Heartless remained split into dozens of merely _Massive Possessors_.

" _Hang on, I'll catch you!_ " Xion dove to catch her friend, swooped back into the air with him under her free arm, and summoned Ouroboros (her jaw-sword, not Hazama's chain). _"Ragnarok! Everyone let 'em have it!_ " Xion's attack sent orange trails swirling into various Massive Possessors, splitting them apart again into ordinary Possessors. Xion hung back to defend the guy who couldn't fly, while the rest of Team Kairi joined the fray without her.

Now that she'd had a moment to rest (despite all the crazy stuff that just went down), Lambda summoned a pair of Fire Options and sent them to burn away more Possessors. Kairi sped past clumps of Heartless and ripped them open with her Keyblade and the slipstream from her Striker Unit. Hazama shot spikes between herself and Ouroboros, with more Possessors as the unfortunate monkeys in the middle. Yoshika and Three filled the air with bullets and beams, respectively, burning away the legion of gaseous Heartless.

Against such an assault, there was nothing the various components of the Gigas Possessor could do but die. Soon, the air was clear of any clouds of Darkness. However, Hive 2953 was still possessed - Lambda's scans revealed that there was another Gigas Possessor engulfing its core. Now the real battle could begin.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Really save Hive 2953 from the Gigas Possessor!_

But first, there were some things to clear up. While the Hive spun in place a bit, seeming to get its bearings, Xion asked, "How did you get here, Axel?"

"I'll get to that. First things first, some introductions seem to be needed. First, that's not my name anymore. I'm not Axel." Over a radio like the ones Yoshika handed out, he continued, " _I'm Lea. L-E-A. Got it memorized?_ "

Xion hummed in agreement. He must have been recompleted, like Yen Sid explained before this whole Training Worlds thing really started. " _Sure. Okay, Lea, I'm Xion. Do...do you remember me?_ "

" _Yeah, I've got your name memorized...er, again. X-I-O-N. I don't remember you looking quite that cool and robot-y before, though. You were just a half-pint the last time we met._ "

Xion huffed. " _Close, but I distinctly remember being twenty feet taller than you in my final form. And why didn't you get any robot parts in this world?_ "

Lea nodded, but then adopted a more serious expression. " _I was talking about...after that._ "

Xion murmured, "...Right." Back when she died in Roxas' arms. " _I suppose you met Roxas on the way here, then?_ "

" _'Met' him? He was the one who called me here! When I got to the Hub, he did some Observation thing and said I don't need to worry about it anymore. Then I grabbed a plane from the Base back behind us and flew here as fast as I could. Oh, Roxas also said to tell you that he likes your new hammer, Xion._ "

Xion blushed. " _A-anyway, we should probably get back to fighting that Hive._ "

Lambda reported, " _Scanning...Hive 2953's core and Gigas Possessor located near the bottom of the structure. Transmitting data...done!_ " The core appeared as a red dot superimposed on the Hive's shell in Xion's, Hazama's, and Three's vision. " _Target's armor rating: B. Attack power: S. Its armor is thick, but fragile. Any repeated attacks should be able to break through. Those tentacles can be destroyed with minimal firepower. Don't get anywhere near its beams, though!_ "

Kairi came up with a plan. " _Okay, then, Xion and Lea, blast us a way in. Lambda, cover me as we deal with those tentacles and any other minions it spits out. Hazama, you want in?_ "

Hazama shook her head, sending ripples down her hair. " _I can't help you with this one, or it'd just reset everything. I'll just deal with any Heartless that show up...now._ " Just as she predicted, another swarm of Wyverns and colored spellcasters appeared between them and the Hive. "... _Three, can you help with these? I have limited spikes to throw around. Yoshika, you can help too, if you want._ " It would take a while to deal with so many Heartless with a limited supply of spikes. Plus, Hazama was coming to realize that, like most activities, slaughtering weaklings was more fun with friends around.

Yoshika replied, " _I'll protect Three!_ "

Three raised its beam-shooting arms. " _Your assistance is appreciated. My beams will be ineffective against a Hive, so I will prioritize the smaller Heartless escorts. Addendum: the Hive has not created any new Neuroi units after it was corrupted - no further reinforcements are likely. Estimated time until nanomachine cloud regeneration: 10 minutes._ "

Kairi nodded. " _That's plenty of time. Okay, everyone, ready...go!_ "

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Break through Hive 2953's armor and use Release on the boss!_

Xion rocketed toward the Hive with Lea in tow. As they approached, the huge purple spot facing them began to glow brighter, and then the air they were traveling through was filled with an enormous black beam. When the beam faded, Xion and Lea were nowhere to be seen.

Kairi stared wide-eyed at the last place they were visible. " _No...did they...?_ "

Hazama just cackled. " _Of course not! Otherwise, you wouldn't still be here to cry about it!_ "

" _...Oh, right._ "

" _That was a close one!_ " A burst of fire heralded Lea and Xion's return. " _Probably should've mentioned this, but I can turn into and manipulate fire a lot better now that I'm a whole person again. If I do it right, it's like teleporting! And now it's_ _my_ _turn, you huge hunk of junk!_ " Lea unleashed a compressed beam of fire right back at the purple spot, blasting a path straight out the opposite corner of the Hive. Luckily, he missed the Core while accomplishing his goal of disabling the only giant cannon facing him. " _Yeah! That's how we BURN!_ "

" _That's our way in! C'mon, Kairi! Sonic Blade!_ " Xion launched herself into the hole Axel made, moving too fast for the tentacles around it to react. Once inside, she started firing her Arm Cannon at the marker on her HUD, slowly blasting closer to the core.

" _Uh-oh!_ " As Kairi moved to follow, the Hive emitted a haunting screech, and its metal shell started to undulate. The tentacles outside the Hive curled inward, even the ones on the undamaged faces of the pyramid, and began firing beams in Xion's general direction. The Hive was blasting away its own armor to get at her.

" _Can't let you do that, Heartless!_ " Lambda summoned two Options and sent them zooming around to the other sides of the Hive, then lunged at the closest tentacle and cut it off with Elysium. " _That felt good, but it looks like my Options don't have quite enough oomph to break through the others._ " Well, if a powerup was in order... " _IDEA Engine, activate!_ " Lambda's Keyblade was surrounded by green holograms, and her Options began firing faster, stronger green shots. The tentacles on the other two sides of the Hive were destroyed quickly.

" _I've got these two!_ " Kairi skimmed past the side of the Hive, severing the last two tentacles as she passed. " _There, now it can't shoot beams anymore!_ "

" _Just in time, too; it almost got through!_ " Xion stared at a hole where one of the beams had managed to carve all the way to the center, barely missing her. She would've sweatdropped, but her current robot body couldn't sweat. " _Can you help me drill? It's regenerating faster the closer I get, and Lea would just blow up the core if he tried to blast this armor._ "

" _I'm on it! Lambda, help Hazama's group!_ " Hazama and the rest were doing a fine job of chewing through the surrounding Heartless flunkies, but there were just so many enemies that beating them one at a time was no good.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Defeat all of the Heartless!_

" _Acknowledged. Firaga!_ " Lambda dismissed her Options, turned away from the Hive, and cast a spell at the swarm of Heartless, with her Keyblade still covered in the IDEA Engine's holograms...

A sharp _*SHEENG*_ sound unexpectedly accompanied her spell, and Elysium flashed white for a moment. The fireball that launched from Elysium's tip was much larger than a normal Firaga, surrounded by the same green holograms as the Keyblade, and created a massive explosion when it hit a Wyvern. A thousand Heartless were destroyed in the blast, including Red Nocturnes that should have absorbed the fire.

Hazama, Yoshika, Three, and even the Heartless all stopped moving to stare at the smoky aftermath. Hazama finally asked, " _...Okay, Lambda, I'll bite. What the hell just happened?_ "

" _I have no idea! ...Er, no pun intended. Replaying... Analyzing... Wow, that's neat! Okay, I've figured it out._ " As Lambda explained, the holographic glow around Elysium finally faded.

She morphed her Keyblade into Petal Blades and began slicing the few remaining Heartless apart like a buzz-saw as she kept talking into the radio. " _It looks like that was an effect of the IDEA Engine. The cosmic quantum weirdness, or_ _however_ _this thing works, sometimes aligns just right and overcharges whatever I'm trying to do. It boosted my Firaga into a Firaza, which is at least two levels higher, and bypassed any defenses or resistances. Quantum Critical...I think that's a good name for this effect. I can't predict if or when it'll happen again, though._ "

Hazama and the rest rejoined the fight. " _A lucky break, then. That, and a sneak preview of how strong your magic could be someday. I'd better put in more work to maintain my the-fact-that-I'm-still-cooler-than-you! Boom, headshot!_ " She nailed the last Wyvern in the face with a spike without looking, beating Yoshika's slower aim to the punch.

Three reported for the benefit of the team members who were still inside the Hive, " _All Heartless reinforcements destroyed. Awaiting instructions..._ "

Xion replied, " _Just hang back; we've finally broken through!_ " By rotating her ScimitArs like a drill and intermittently launching Arm Cannon shots and Kairi's spells, they'd managed to overpower the regeneration rate of the Hive's innermost armor. " _Kairi! Now!_ "

" _Take this!_ " Kairi and Xion lined up their Keyblades and Released the Gigas Possessor hiding in the Hive's core. The cloudy Heartless rushed out of the wrecked shell of the Hive and gathered itself together in the open sky. Hive 2953 was freed from possession, and all the purple hexagons on its shell turned red as its armor began to regenerate fully. Lea fire-ported himself and the girls outside as the interior of the Hive closed up.

" _I don't feel like fighting another one of these..._ " Hazama complained.

Namine spoke up. _"I don't think we'll actually have to. The Hive probably deserves it more, don't you think?"_ Now that Hive 2953 was free and repaired, one of its giant beam spots had turned to face the Gigas Possessor. With one shot, it annihilated the boss.

Kairi tensed up for a second, then relaxed. " _...Phew, it looks like that didn't cause a reset. But where's the Practice Keyhole?_ "

" _Scanning...Objective located. It's back at the Base?!_ "

" _Let's hurry back, then!_ "

Yoshika hesitated. " _Three, what will you do?_ "

Three turned toward the Hive. " _...I haven't been eliminated yet. Reestablishing connection to Hive 2953...successfully connected. All mission objectives achieved. Yoshika Miyafuji: our temporary alliance is no longer necessary, so I will return to Hive 2953 where I belong. However, I...believe...that I'm going to miss you. Goodbye, friend. May there be peace between our species someday._ " Three slowly floated toward the Hive, then teleported inside.

Yoshika's eyes started to mist over, but she wiped her tears away. "Goodbye, Three. I'll miss you, too." She turned back to where Team Kairi had gathered together. " _You need to unlock this 'Practice Keyhole' to finish what you came here for, right? Let's go, then._ "

Namine asked gently, _"Do you need some time?"_

Yoshika smiled brightly, with only a few tears left in her eyes. " _No, I'm fine, really. We expected the Hive to kill Three even if we won, right? At least they're still alive. It even looks like the Neuroi will stop attacking, but only if the Hive and I can get back to where we belong and spread the news. So I still have a job to do, to make sure everyone is safe._ "

Hazama gave her a thumbs-up. " _Well said. And that's coming from me - just so you know, your voice is the most goddamn annoying thing I've ever heard._ "

Yoshika yelped, " _Hey, that's not nice at all!_ "

Everyone laughed all the way back to base.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Sky of Battle: The Base..._

Everyone touched down on the runway and removed their radios and/or Striker Units. As Kairi was lacing up her shoes, Lambda suddenly turned toward the hangar gate. "There's someone inside - someone really strong! Wait, this reading...it can't be..." Lambda summoned Elysium and opened the gate, which rose up to reveal another newcomer from the ground up, starting with a pair of shining silver leg blades.

Xion muttered, "Another Murakumo Unit?"

Hazama grinned in anticipation. "This one isn't just any old Unit. I'm impressed even an illusion of her can exist in this timeline..."

The gate continued to rise, revealing a much skimpier set of armor than the bodysuits and harnesses on other Murakumo Units. Blue plates of metal covered only the bare minimum to allow a parody of modesty. A ragged sheet of blonde hair flowed down between the newcomer and her eight blue floating Petals. Finally, her face was revealed, with vivid Azure blue eyes and deceptively innocent features shadowed by a crown-like forehead guard.

Lambda reported, "Target identified as Boundary Interface Prime Field Device Number 12, Anti-Sankishin Core Unit: Mu. Other known aliases: Kusanagi, the Godslayer, Eye of the Azure, 'Noel Vermillion'."

"The real question is, is that the real her, or a product of this world?"

Mu-12 was the one who responded. "...The latter, but I speak with the original's voice. Merlin contacted me, to confirm his theories. Even so, if this world existed a month ago, the Azure Timeline and the Heart Timeline would have been too incompatible to allow me to exist here. I am, in many ways, a pillar of support for the Azure Timeline, which was falling into a destructive feedback loop until very recently. This timeline, on the other hand, is being strengthened, both naturally and by Lambda's attempts to alter it. It's only due to Terumi's defeat in the Azure Timeline, breaking the destined loop, that the two continua were able to synchronize at all."

"Um...what's she talking about?" Yoshika asked.

"Remember what I said about Namine?" Kairi whispered.

"That it was too complicated to explain?" Yoshika loudly "whispered" back.

"Yeah."

Lambda brought the focus back to the topic at hand. "So, what you're saying is that everything that's happened - the Time Breaks, my unusually powerful Observation, the voices in my and Kairi's heads, the fact that I'm not a Murakumo Unit anymore, the fact that we're all here in the Training Worlds instead of waiting for Sora to handle everything - all of that is connected?"

"Affirmative. In fact, all of these events connect directly to _you_ , Lambda. You were chosen by the Azure and Kingdom Hearts jointly, to be the one who can rejoin the damaged and separated timelines and repair the world."

"...What? That's...that changes my whole perspective! So the Azure Timeline and the Heart Timeline _do_ have a common origin! I suspected that was the case, even back when I saw the Greek influences in Olympus Colosseum." It felt like forever ago that a misunderstanding ended with her running laps under the lecherous gaze of Philoctetes the hero-training satyr.

"I believe there are even more fractured timelines than these two, each with their own parallel worlds, their own version of the godlike, otherworldly force that controls them, their own heroes trying to prevent everything from sinking into their own seas of death...but even if there are, you mustn't overextend yourself. If you were to die, all that has transpired would be rewritten without you, and the only chance our timelines have to truly heal would be lost. But fear not, for you have the blessings of both the Azure and Kingdom Hearts. Soon, the time will come to fulfill your true purpose as the _Event Convergence Moderator_. Grow stronger here, so you will be ready."

"An _Event Convergence Moderator..._ So that's the kind of unit I am now." Lambda closed her eyes in contemplation, and her armor and visor vanished, leaving her in her bodysuit and the other clothes Kairi had bought for her. When her eyes opened again, their color had changed from red to purple. "...Good thing I don't need that flight equipment anymore. And what about you?"

"This is a temporary body that exists only to pass along a message. I'll go back to the Azure Timeline, to continue enjoying the happy ending a nameless hero bought us. Once you have solved the core conflict of the Heart Timeline, only then will it be possible for us to meet again. The fear and doubt created by Xehanort runs as deep into the fabric of the World as that created by Terumi; you must ensure the survival of this timeline before it can be connected to the other. For what it's worth, having only just met you, I believe you have what it takes to succeed. Farewell."

Mu-12 vanished in a pillar of blue light, leaving behind an empty hangar. Behind where she once was, the empty harness for Kairi's Striker Unit had a glowing Keyhole on it.

"Well, now I know for sure why I came to this timeline in the first place, and what I need to do. Talk about a tall order! I'm not afraid, though. My own powers are growing stronger all the time, and I have all of you to help, right?" Lambda unlocked the Practice Keyhole.

Kairi nodded firmly. "Right, and I'm sure the others outside the Training Worlds will want to help, too. Although, I guess this is goodbye, Yoshika."

Blue sparks of Light began to rise up around Yoshika. "It sure looks that way. It was nice meeting you all! I hope we'll meet again someday...even if I'm just an illusion. I almost didn't even figure it out. But...I'm not sad. There's a real me out there, too, I'm sure of it! And she'll help the Neuroi and everyone else just like I did someday. If you meet her, tell her 'hi' for me, okay?"

Lambda, Kairi, and Xion all replied at the same time, "I promise." Then they all looked at each other and giggled at the coincidence. Yoshika joined the laughter until she vanished. Far away, a giant pillar of Light lanced into the sky as Hive 2953 and all the Neuroi it created also vanished.

Hazama sighed in relief. "Time to go back, everyone! I miss my fedora. Save point, save point..." She looked around the room.

"I'll handle that." Kairi concentrated on the way she could leave her self-initiated Dives to the Heart, and sure enough, a green save point flashed into being under her feet. This one didn't have a constant pool of Light at the center; it was just the circling green trails.

Lambda scanned the new save point. "Scanning... Yes, we can get back to the Hub with this. It would vanish if Heartless showed up, and then you'd have to make a new one, but still, full marks for convenience! How did you learn to do that?"

Namine replied, _"She does this in her heart's Station when I start snoring."_

"Whatever! This Training World's over, so let's just go already!" Lea squeezed into the save point beside Kairi and vanished.

"Hey, wait for me! ...Oh man, I'm gonna miss this armor. Maybe I should make it into a new weapon..." Xion jumped into the save point and vanished.

"I guess I can't just stand here processing all that new information all day." Lambda walked into the save point and disappeared.

"I can't moonwalk into the save point while floating like this...time to fix that." Hazama floated over the save point and disappeared, eager to get back to her/his normal form.

"...I'm the one who made the save point. Why am I the last one going through?" Kairi vanished.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: There we go! A real humdinger of a reveal there, eh?I hope this was worth waiting until 2019, TheMightyGyarapie!_


	12. Power Nap

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 12: Power Nap**

 **-"Liking the Look!"-**

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: First and foremost: KINGDOM HEARTS 3 IS HERE! Jumping Meow Wows, you guys, after more than a dozen years, it's here! And I already finished playing through the main storyline._

 _Verdict: The next book of the Time Break Saga (yes, I just said "next book") will have to outright ignore most of KH3's canon. This is a result of me never having played the Kingdom Hearts χ mobile games. Like, who even is Strelitzia? Also, I hate hate **HATE** what that game did to Kairi. Practically the whole game was a slap in the face to her entire character arc. I vow to avenge our Princess by writing a better resolution for her than that!_

 _Anyway, back to the show! Er...back to another Midnight Town interlude! It's okay, though: big power-ups are in store! For a limited time only. Offer void in The Land of the Musketeers. While supplies last. Your results may vary. Side effects may include pink._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Training Worlds: Hub..._

Lea was the first to reappear in the Hub, where Roxas was waiting. "Welcome back, Axel."

Lea grabbed his forehead and groaned. " _Lea!_ L-E-A! Get the other one un-memorized! ...Sorry, I just dealt with a bunch of that from the others."

Roxas shrugged. "To be fair, you never actually told me your real name. And speaking of things you haven't done yet, I see your Keyblade hasn't come to you."

In the soon-to-be famous words of Sora, Lea whined, "Give me a break! These things take time, okay?"

Roxas actually took him seriously. "Do they? That's another thing I wouldn't know. I've always had mine."

" _I_ would know," Xion pointed out, having arrived without being noticed. "Just give it time; some situation to trigger it is bound to come up. It's like destiny, or something."

" _Real_ helpful advice there!" Hazama pointed out as he tried to grab Xion in a surprise noogie, but missed. "Also, thank Merlin that everything's back to normal for everyone, body-wise. Just thought I'd point that out."

Xion had Dodge Rolled out of Hazama's reach. "Yeah, but I'm definitely going to try and turn that armor into one of my weapon sets."

Hazama agreed, "Yeah, the spike guns were sweet as hell. Too bad my Bonus TP item isn't one of those."

"We're just going to gloss over the mother of all exposition bombs we got hit with, then?" Lambda asked as she rejoined the group.

She received nods from all around. Hazama replied for the group, "Yep, we're ignoring it. That was _your_ mother of all exposition bombs, not ours. And there's not much point to worrying about it until we deal with Xehanort, right?"

Xion asked, "'We?' As in, you too?"

Hazama just smirked.

Kairi finally showed up. "Sorry I'm late! Did I miss anything?"

" _No, just the usual light-hearted bickering,_ " Namine replied after casually reading Roxas' memories.

Roxas cleared his throat. "Well, now that everyone's here, I can give you the news you've all been waiting for: you all have enough Bonus TP to buy your personal bonus items! Lea, you get yours for free as a handicap for joining late. Here's a voucher; just give it to the shopkeeper at 'Accessories, Sold Separately' and you'll get a new toy _._ "

The team's reactions, in order of Lambda, Kairi, Xion, Hazama, Namine, and Lea, were:

"Finally!"

"I can't wait!"

"Already got mine."

"About goddamn time!"

" _How will I even hold it?_ "

"Free bonus item? Sign me up!"

Roxas stepped aside and gestured to the door to Training World 1. "I guess you're all heading to back Midnight Town, then. See you later! Oh, and watch out for Terumi. Whatever he was doing before, he's stopped, but I don't think that's a good thing."

Hazama tipped his fedora to put an extra-deep shadow over his eyes. "Oh, is that all? Remember, everyone, I called dibs this time!"

Everyone simultaneously replied, " _We remember,_ " including Lea, although he didn't actually remember; he was just playing along to keep the crazy guy pointed in some other direction.

They all filed through the door to Midnight Town.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _RE: Midnight Town: Town Square..._

Once everyone had arrived, Lambda asked, "Okay, should we split up to get our bonus items faster, or travel in a group to be sure Terumi attacks Hazama first?"

Kairi decided, "Let's stay grouped up. That way, we can all ooh and aah over each other's bonus items, too."

"Quite a compelling argument," Hazama agreed. "So, what's our first stop?"

Kairi pointed east. " _Ms. Wardrobe's Wardrobe._ It has the items for both Lambda and myself, and it's right nearby."

With a chorus of affirmatives, the team set off on their shopping spree.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _East Street: Ms. Wardrobe's Wardrobe..._

Kairi and Lambda went into the store while the rest of the group stayed outside. After about a minute, Lambda was the first to emerge.

"Okay, everyone, check _this_ out!" Lambda's long braid was now tied back by a clip that extended into a cylinder reminiscent of a gun's barrel, complete with a seemingly unnecessary revolver chamber where her hair went into it. Moving only her hair, Lambda pointed the clip straight up and fired a brilliant white laser, which persisted for a moment as she traced a line across the sky. "It's called the 'Braid Beam': it has infinite ammo, deals sustained non-elemental damage, and on top of all that, it looks pretty cool!"

Xion clapped. "Ooh! Aah!"

Hazama slow-clapped. "Generic approving vocalizations!"

Lea raised an eyebrow at Hazama. "You really put a lot of effort into trolling, don't you?"

Hazama consumed the snark and was nourished. "Why, thank you! I'm glad you noticed!"

Kairi finally exited the store, wearing a whole new outfit. She did a slow spin to show it off. "Okay, I'm ready! How do I look?"

Kairi's new "Very Special Outfit" consisted mostly of a sleeveless dress made of a tougher material than her old outfit. A pink hood with black cat-ear decorations hung unused from her neck. Most of the dress was pink, except for black sections above the bust line and by her hips. Pairs of silver buttons were fastened down the front of the garment, but they didn't seem to be holding it on in any way; that was what the zipper trailing halfway down the middle was for, but Kairi had it fully opened to reveal a white camisole she was wearing underneath. There was also a black belt fitted snugly around her waist, from which she hung the Pouch of Holding from her previous outfit over her right hip. Her arms fit through wide holes surrounded by black frills with pink plaid lines.

Below the waist was a short but complicated skirt. On her left side, it was a double-layered black frilly skirt with pink and white plaid designs, but on the right it was a plain black pleated skirt. Her feet were covered by wide black boots with thick soles, but the majority of her legs were left uncovered.

Kairi had also taken the liberty of purchasing a "Buster Band" (+5 Defense) - a wide bracelet covered in tough-looking metal studs - clasped on her left wrist, and a silver "Fire Chain" (+4 Defense, +50% Fire Resistance) wrapped around her right wrist, both intended to mitigate potential friendly fire from Lea's wide-area explosive powers. She also still wore her teardrop-shaped pendant around her neck, of course. She couldn't remember ever _not_ wearing that particular item.

Xion gave her a thumbs-up. "You look...adventurous!"

Lea followed suit. "Yeah! Liking the look!"

Hazama mentioned, "It's actually a bit _less_ skimpy than I'm used to seeing..."

Lambda asked, "So, what about those 'very special powers' the advertisement mentioned?"

Kairi grinned. "That's the best part! First, there's this..." She held a palm out towards Lambda, who was suddenly surrounded in a pink aura of Light.

Lambda looked herself over. "Whoa! That's warm, and...strong? Wait, that's way too vague - why did I even bother saying it? Analyzing...okay, so it bolsters my defenses, heals my wounds, and burns Heartless that get too close. It's sort of like what Riku did to Ansem back in Castle Oblivion. Should we call it...Light Armor?"

Kairi reflexively started to cringe, but then stopped. "Ow, that's...that's actually a pretty good one! Anyway, it turns out I've been doing a little of that to everyone around me, all the time. Bits of extra Light sort of spill out of me and fill up my friends. I think it's like that Drive thing you have, Lambda. Or maybe it's more like Lea's fire control. Either way, now that I know it's happening, I can control it myself, but the power of these clothes lets me go a bit further than that."

Kairi closed her eyes and began to glow with the same pink aura as Lambda. At first, the glow was softer, but a pink flash suddenly blinded everyone. When their eyes cleared, Kairi was gone, and Lambda's outfit had changed.

Lambda's green dress now had pink plaid lines all over it. Right over her chest was a pink emblem of a heart formed from two curved lines that bent against each other before curling inward. Everyone except Hazama felt an instant recognition of the symbol, although Lambda's recognition was secondhand from the "database" that she now knew was Kingdom Hearts' connection to her. Apparently, this emblem was the symbol of Kingdom Hearts itself - a fitting motif for the power granted by one of its Seven Princesses.

On top of the changes to her clothes, an ethereal pink halo floated over Lambda's head, and pink sparkles danced in the air all around her. Perhaps most importantly, Lambda's Keyblade, **Elysium** , had summoned itself to her right hand, while Kairi's Keyblade, **Destiny's Embrace** , had appeared in her left. Lambda could feel the immense surge of magic and physical strength this new form gave her.

Kairi's voice came from inside Lambda, " _See? With this, I can do the reverse of Sora's Drive Form thing: I can grant 'Heart Form' to anyone I want! Of course, it wears off pretty fast - it lasts about half a minute, I think. Or I can cancel it early..._ " A smaller pink flash heralded Kairi's reappearance and Lambda's return to normal, "...and even if time ran out, I can jump to someone else right away!"

Another flash came, with only half as much buildup as before - Kairi had just slowed the charging period earlier to make it easier to see. Suddenly, Xion was the one who had entered Heart Form. The pink plaid and heart logo overwrote her T-shirt's slogan (which Xion suddenly realized she had forgotten to set, leaving a blank white bar), and Kairi's Keyblade appeared crossed against Xion's **Forget-Me-Not** behind her back. " _All that, and both people get full healing every time I merge!_ "

Heart Xion looked herself over. "You sound like Namine does. Namine, are you in there, too?"

Namine replied, " _Yes. We both have front row seats in your heart's Station. It's nice to see you again, Kairi!_ "

Xion touched a hand to her chin thoughtfully. "Hmm. I've never actually seen my own Station."

Namine promised, " _I'll start drawing a picture for you once Heart Form ends._ " A moment later, Kairi canceled the Form and reappeared.

Lea clapped. "Now _that's_ a useful trick!"

"The tactical implications are huge," Hazama agreed, "but I kind of wish it didn't come with so much pink."

"It would probably be a bad idea to do it to you anyway, Hazama," Kairi pointed out. "What if your BlazBlue thing just _eats_ me?"

Hazama smirked. "Good point! I'll just have to live with having my own overpowered Drive ability and that 'BlazBlue thing', I guess. Hardly a bad deal. In the meantime, watch out for that moment where you have to reappear between merges. That's an exploitable weakness if I ever saw one."

Lambda asked, "So, now that we know what these two bonus items do, what's our next stop? _Blades backwards-R Us_ , for Hazama's 'Beam Knives'?"

Kairi agreed, "Sure. _Seers_ is just across the street from there, too, so we can pick up Namine's 'Memory Flasher' at the same time. Then we can head further east to _Accessories, Sold Separately_ for Lea's item, whatever it is."

Xion wondered, "Why is there another accessory store, anyway? Lambda got her beam-shooting accessory from right here."

Kairi shrugged. "Where's the fun in only having one place to shop? Plus, I bet Merlin had to add it when Lea showed up, the same way Blades backwards-R Us showed up for Hazama."

Lea shouted, "Who cares?! Let's just go buy more cool stuff!"

...They went.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Outside Seers..._

Kairi and Hazama entered the shops on either side of the street, leaving Lea, Lambda, and Xion waiting outside. Luckily, they didn't have to wait very long; the leader and guest star of the team walked right back out, twirling their bonus items around their fingers in perfect sync with each other. They both had a quick chuckle once they noticed each other. Kairi announced, "For now, I'll be holding onto the Memory Flasher for Namine. The next Xehanort look-alike who tries to kidnap me is in for quite a surprise!"

Hazama snickered as he tossed and caught one of his new glowing green energy blades. "Shame they won't remember. As for me, this is obviously the coolest thing ever. I mean, come on! Beam Knives? And check out the kickass trail they leave behind!" With some blisteringly fast knife work, Hazama wrote _"#RoyaltyFreeLightsabers"_ in front of his face. The green lines trailing behind his movements hung in the air for a few seconds after he thumbed a switch on the hilt and turned off the blade. "Hands off, everyone - the trails are just as deadly as the blades themselves."

Xion gasped and raised a finger. "That reminds me, I forgot to set this thing up again!" She changed the blank slogan on her shirt to read _"Premium Content"_.

Lea chuckled, relieved that Xion was definitely over the depressing state she was in before her resurrection. "Just one more shop to hit. I wonder what kind of bonus item Merlin had planned for me?"

"Let's find out," Lambda replied. As she set off down the street, she dug into her Pouch of Holding and tossed something at Kairi behind her back. After catching it, Kairi saw it was the for-all-ages Keyblade transformation manual, _There Goes a Keyblade Glider!_ Lambda remarked, "It looks like you're the only other one who can get anything useful out of it right now. Lea hasn't got his Keyblade yet, Hazama doesn't need one, and Namine is intangible. As for Xion..."

"Yeah, I don't need to transform my Keyblade to access other cool weapons. Case in point..." Xion was suddenly obscured in a cloud of golden sparkles. When the effect faded, everyone saw that she'd achieved her earlier goal by summoning a suit of armor that let her look just like she did in the previous Training World, including all its built-in functions. "I call it 'Bot Armor.'" She dismissed the armor right after naming it.

"More puns again..." Kairi sighed.

Lea pointed out, "Y'know, as one single-element specialist to another, I've gotta break it to you: you're always gonna be surrounded by puns on your element, no matter how hard you try to avoid them. You're just gonna have to learn to embrace it. Got it memorized?"

Kairi facepalmed. "...Yes, this is definitely a losing battle. I don't exactly have a list of Light puns off the top of my head, though."

Hazama put in, "Someone else will make them if you don't."

Lambda raised her hand. "I volunteer!"

Kairi quickly cut her off. "No, no, that's okay! I'll come up with a few shining examples on my own, thanks."

"See? It's easy. Got it -"

Everyone interrupted Lea at the same time: " _Yes, we got it memorized!_ "

"What's the big deal with you and memory, anyway?" Lambda asked.

Lea tried to put together his thoughts on the matter for a bit, but then noticed a colorful neon sign up ahead labeling the front of _Accessories, Sold Separately._ "...Tell you later. We're here!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Outside Accessories, Sold Separately..._

Lea spent only a minute inside the store, then came back out wearing a silver string around his neck with a chunky red star dangling from it. Lambda's scan revealed that the charm was some sort of Gummi Block. Lea announced, "Everyone, check out my new bling! Apparently, it's called a Summon Shard, and it can summon my friends to my location, even from other worlds."

Xion raised her hand to volunteer. "Well, let's try it!"

"Sure, just as soon as I figure - oh." The Summon Shard flashed bright red, and Xion suddenly turned translucent. At the same time, a translucent copy of her appeared standing next to Lea, holding her Keyblade.

The Xion standing next to Lambda seemed frozen in time while the new one looked herself over. "Whoa, this is weird. I can see myself standing over there...and over here. My body is solid over there, but only my weapon is solid over here...and I can't move both of me at the same time. I guess the summoning ends when I get hit at the source, or if I can't take the strain of being in two places at once?"

Lea replied, "Yep. That, or either one of us could dismiss the summoning. The really cool part, though, is that you can commit to the summoning instead, and end up actually teleporting to me, but you can't be dismissed back to where you started if you commit - remember that! The instruction sheet sure was informative. It was really easy to activate, too...hope I don't set it off by accident."

Kairi grinned. "Even with all the rules and restrictions, this will make it easy to get everyone back together if we all get split up or end up on different missions!"

Lambda added, "It could also be a quick fix if you just need Xion to bail you out of a jam. Trust me, she's become a pro at cleaning up my messes."

Xion committed to the summoning, and the version of her at Lea's side became solid while the one next to Lambda faded away. "Aw, thanks!"

"No, thank _you_ ," Lambda replied.

"Looks like it could cause all kinds of nasty misunderstandings if you don't explain how it works," Hazama pointed out. "I mean, say you're a random local hero or civilian traveling with Xion. Suddenly, she freezes up for a few seconds, then fades away and vanishes off the face of the world before she can tell anyone not to panic."

Lea flinched. "Yikes, that's gonna be something to think about. You're really good at this whole adventuring thing, Hazama!"

Hazama shrugged. "Just calling it like I see it. I've actually only been at this for...er, a couple weeks, maybe. Only since Lambda asked me to join. I expected more apprehension from the new guy - didn't you meet Terumi?"

"You mean the jerk in the Black Coat? Xemnas introduced to us to him once, then I never saw him again. Roxas mentioned him, too...is he bad news?"

A deep voice with a slight reverb answered, _**"Absolutely!"**_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Defeat Terumi!_

A grotesque, slimy mass of green and purple Darkness slithered out of two nearby alleyways, joining together into a single massive blob. Several thin tendrils reached out of random parts of it and waved in the air before being reabsorbed. Jagged green glowing patches ignited on the side facing Team Kairi, giving the impression of eyes. **"Behold, my new form!"**

Kairi raised an eyebrow. "I'm beholding...and it's disgusting. It looks like you turned yourself into a blob of sewage."

Xion crossed her arms. "Tentacles? Seriously?"

Lambda scanned him, getting back highly worrisome results. "Scanning...target confirmed as Terumi. Overall threat level is SS. Strength: SS. Magic output: SS. Defenses: SS. Range: variable. Power of Darkness intensity: 100%. Weak point: unknown. His magical power output exceeds Roxas', so we probably can't even hurt him with the methods we've used before. Effective strategy: unknown. But, Hazama, you called dibs, right? Do you have a plan?"

Hazama smirked and swept into a bow holding his fedora against his chest. "But of course! I _might_ need a few seconds of cover to make it work, though."

 **"Not this time! Feel the wrath of a god!"** Tentacles whipped out of the blob, stretching out to ensnare each of the heroes, but met with no success.

Xion jumped over them and equipped her Bot Armor, using her dash boots to change directions quickly and stay one step ahead of the flock. "Ooh, so close! Nope! Too slow! Sorry!"

Kairi vanished to give Heart Form to Lambda, causing the tentacles coming her way to grasp uselessly at empty air. _"You won't find any easily captured princesses here, sorry!"_

Lea blasted the tentacles headed his way with a huge fireball, then burst into flames and fireported away when the pseudopods were unaffected. "Just as I thought. You've powered up enough to fight Roxas, even though he's way stronger than us."

"Protect Option!" Heart Lambda generated a shield-shaped Option to surround herself and Hazama in a barrier, creating the necessary cover for Hazama's plan. Tentacles bashed against the shield, creating several cracks, but it would take a few seconds to get through.

Hazama, for his part, hunched over and crossed his arms behind his head. "Hey, you so-called 'god'! Remember this neat little trick? Restriction 666 released!"

 **"Oh, SHIT!"** Terumi immediately stopped trying to fight the other heroes and focused all his effort on breaking through Lambda's shield.

"Dimensional interference field deployed!" A green, bestial crest appeared beneath Hazama. Cracks appeared on the shield, but whether they were from Terumi's attacks or the sudden pressure flowing outward from Hazama was anyone's guess.

 **"No, no, no no no..."** Gone was Terumi's apparent god complex. He desperately ramped up his attacks on the barrier.

"Code S.O.L.!"

 **"NONONONONONONO!"** Terumi finally shattered Lambda's shield, causing the Protect Option to flash out of existence...

"Protect Option!" ...Only for Lambda to summon a second copy that generated a smaller shield. One of Terumi's tentacles managed to reach halfway inside, though, and the barrier couldn't close over it. Lambda crossed her Keyblade and Kairi's to hold the tentacle back and keep it from destroying her Option.

"That's right, you know what I'm up to! Blazblue, _ACTIVATE!_ " Hazama thrust his arms out to his sides with a wide grin, and a circle of green runes surrounded him at the edges of Lambda's barrier. The fedora blew off of Hazama's head, but his hair didn't blow around in the wind at all.

The Protect Option, a Drive power created from Lambda's soul, was swallowed by the Drive of the Azure Grimoire: Soul Eater. The barrier vanished, and Lambda stumbled away. She air-dashed as far from Hazama as she could get before she could lose any more of her soul to Hazama's all-consuming aura. As she landed on the far side of the street, Heart Form ended and Kairi reappeared next to her.

 **"DAMN YOU!"** Terumi screamed in rage, but backed away in fear. The tentacle he'd been using, however, was caught in Hazama's aura and left unable to retract as Hazama used it like a straw to suck in more of Terumi's gathered Darkness.

Hazama slowly walked forward and opened his unnerving yellow eyes, forcing Terumi to back away with each step he took. "You seem to know what's what, but let's recap anyway for the kids. You had me created to be your meatshield and host body. You needed something capable of housing a god, something with enough power to kick all the people who hated you to the curb. The Azure Grimoire was pretty much the only thing that fit the bill. Now, how does one make an Azure Grimoire? You take a scrap of Azure and cover it in a shitload of seithr, producing a fun-sized Boundary, with all the reality-screwing properties that implies. With the BlazBlue you created this way, A.K.A. _me_ , I could use the Drive 'Soul Eater' to turn just about anything - souls, magic, matter, energy - into seithr, which the BlazBlue eats to fuel all its other asskicking powers. Then you left me behind to go scope out the Heart Timeline, where you found a huge surprise: the Power of Darkness works like seithr, but twice as efficiently! Then you went back, fell into an impressively devious trap that managed to separate us, and the rest is history.

"Bottom line: after you spent the last few days surrounding yourself with a big ol' blob of Darkness, all you've managed to do is to turn yourself into my favorite snack! And damn, is it gonna feel good to chow down after a few weeks of fasting! Wouldn't have been sporting to eat all the Heartless we've been fighting and not let the kids train, y'know? But now that I have a target no one will miss, it's _dinner time_!"

 **"NEVER!"** Terumi fired giant green blobs of Darkness from his main mass in panic, but each one ended up swirling into Hazama's circle of runes like sludge down a sewer drain, becoming more fuel for the living BlazBlue. **"Damn it all! How much more power do I have to gain to crush these stubborn insects!?"**

Lambda yelled at Terumi, "You didn't need _any_ more power! If you had stuck around in the Lotus Academy Arena after the first reset, where Kairi could only get some soot on your face even with the most powerful spell at our disposal, you could've beaten us without much trouble. If you'd dodged when Xion dropped her Final Weapon, you could've caught your breath and kept fighting in Spring Falls...assuming the platform survived. If you'd stuck around in the Hub before that, you might've learned Roxas' attack patterns and made use of your only chance to kill Xion and Roxas simultaneously. You only keep losing because you aren't stubborn _enough!_ "

Xion nodded. "Look at you, swaddled in a safety blanket of power that does your fighting for you. That's a fitting strategy for someone too scared of pain and effort to actually fight for what he wants."

Kairi added, "And honestly, since Lambda was perfectly fine with befriending Hazama - and a friend of Lambda's is a friend of ours - the only reason we fought you at all is because you always start these encounters by calling one of us a bitch and then trying to kill us. Why are you so set on being the bad guy?"

Lea played devil's advocate. "If I've got that one meeting Organization XIII had with him memorized, he eats hatred, right? So he _has_ to be the bad guy."

"Wrong," Lambda replied. "The people reconstructed by Observation in this timeline don't seem to have the same limitations they used to. I used to not be able to see Xion's face at all, for one thing, but now everyone sees her the way Roxas does. Hazama can break down and seithr-ize normal food without needing to eat souls. And Terumi can clearly consume Darkness to replace his old diet of hatred, since Darkness comes from hate, among other sources. All those other limitations seem to be replaced by the requirement to maintain the Observation. So, as a Keyblade Master in training, I'm obligated to point out that you could've used your powers for good, Terumi."

 **"Screw the good! I never cared about that shit!"** Terumi was backed up against a wall, too frozen in terror to remember that he could now ooze straight up it.

Hazama took two more steps, bringing his Soul Eater area into contact with Terumi's blob. Darkness was dragged off of it in a constant stream, causing the giant monster to slowly shrink. "And that's why you need to go. The question is, are you going out of the Training Worlds, or into the belly of the Beast?" Hazama took another step, consuming the entire dark blob with a disgusting _***SLURP***_ sound. Terumi's actual body was revealed: a black silhouette with round green eyes and a red gash for a mouth, stuffed into a yellow hoodie and tight leather pants. "Here's your chance to back off. I'm pretty full off all that Darkness you graciously gathered for me, but I always have room for seconds... So, are you gonna run away like you always do? Going _once!_ "

"I'll go, I'll go!" Terumi shrank against the wall.

Since Terumi wasn't already gone, Hazama simply smirked wider and took another step. "Going _twice!_ "

Terumi vanished in a burst of green flames. Hazama chuckled. "And _sold!_ " The circle of runes from BlazBlue vanished, and Hazama closed his eyes and re-summoned his fedora.

Lambda reported, "Observing...yep, he's gone. He went back to the Hub and left through a Corridor of Darkness. And...perfect! From the feedback of him passing through the bubble, I've just figured out how to wean him off my Observation. It'll take a while to make sure, so I'll have to go into standby for the night." Lambda sat down right there on the ground and closed her eyes, focusing on delicately reducing the scope of her Observation.

Kairi slumped in relief as the tension from the battle left her. "Sounds good. Lea, can you carry her while we go to the inn?"

Lea heaved a sigh as he heaved Lambda's unresponsive body over his shoulder. "Yeah, I guess. I wish the rest of us could've done more to help fight that guy, though."

Namine agreed, _"It does feel strange to beat such a major enemy only halfway through our training, just by letting Hazama handle it."_

Xion shrugged and dismissed her Bot Armor. "It couldn't be helped. Hazama called dibs, and like we've gone over, we can't really force either of those two to do anything."

"Then it's a good thing friendship isn't about forcing people to do your bidding," Hazama pointed out as the group began the long walk over to _Inn Name Only_ on the other side of town. "This is all part of the plan, of course. Or at least, it started that way: I wanted a heart of my own, and fusing with a Murakumo Unit and figuring out the nature of hatred by torturing innocent girls both ended up being a bust. So after being reconstructed here in the Heart Timeline, I tracked down some of the kids who, rumor has it, can make even computer programs grow hearts just by hanging out with 'em for half an hour. I was still surprised when I actually got sucked into this whole friendship thing for real so quickly, though. Good feels good, as it turns out, and that helps friends stay friends. And friends just like helping each other - no mind control necessary."

Xion tapped her temple and grinned. "Looks like you've got it memorized."

Lea exclaimed, "Hey, that's _my_ catchphrase!" But he was ignored.

Hazama continued, "Once I got a heart, I was expecting a huge wave of guilt for all the top-tier evil shit I did in the Azure Timeline, but...nope, not really. Either I'm still a total goddamn sociopath, or maybe it's because Lambda already forgave me, just like _that_." He punctuated his theory by snapping his fingers.

Namine pointed out, _"Well, it wasn't to people we know, and if I've read Lambda's memories right, the whole Azure Timeline got rebuilt at some point, so it never even happened. Forgiveness is easy when it's not personal...but I think she would've forgiven you anyway, just to mess with the status quo."_

Hazama glanced at Lambda, still asleep on Lea's shoulder...but no one could tell, because Hazama's eyes were shut. "Yep, she's a crafty one. Ambitious, too. She's trying to fight destiny itself...and she's winning. One thing that hasn't changed for me is how good it feels to be on the winning team!"

Lea pointed with his free arm at the huge, resort-quality inn. "This is all super touching, but I think we're here."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Inn Name Only..._

Xion rolled her eyes. "Lea, would it kill you to celebrate a bit? We're finally free of the jerk who's been hounding us for almost a month! If you were here from the start, you'd be way more excited."

"Hey, I've only been alive...er, again...for a few hours. Maybe days; keeping track of time is a pain. Anyway, I haven't had much time to build up stress for a proper catharsis."

Kairi appeased, "Lea will have plenty of time to settle into the team. Right now, I'm going to get our rooms in order. Lea, are you okay bunking with Hazama?" She started negotiating sleeping arrangements with Innkeeper.

Lea shrugged, bouncing Lambda on his shoulder."Sure, why not? I'll just drop Lambda off in your room and crash down the hall."

Namine realized, _"Wait, that's not how this inn works. Lea can only enter his own room, so I guess Lambda will have to sleep with the guys."_

Xion giggled as Lea started blushing. "Just leave her on the couch and keep your mind out of the gutter."

Lea chuckled. "Obviously. If I don't maintain utmost honor, Riku would kill me...twice!"

Hazama mused, "I wonder if he's gotten skilled enough to do the same to me...? I can always ask him for a spar when we get back, I suppose."

Kairi yawned and made her way down the space-bending hallway. "Well, good night, everyone."

"I hope you have another of those clairvoyant dreams. Let's go, Lea." Hazama launched himself down the hallway with Ouroboros.

"I'm right behind you!" Lea launched himself down the hall by setting off a man-sized explosion at his feet, which Lambda slept right through.

"That'll be 50 TP for damages," Innkeeper announced. Something behind the front desk chimed as the money was deducted, but it wasn't much of a drain on Team Kairi's massive TP stockpile.

"What is it with guys and not walking normally?" Xion brushed some embers off her shirt and went to her room...by floating on her Sonic Blade wings.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[The Sleeping Worlds, Sora side] Symphony of Sorcery: Starry Trail..._

 _Kairi's dream..._

In her dream, Kairi was an ethereal presence flying beside Sora, who was using a trail of stardust as a grind rail to chase a tough Dream Eater that looked like a bird dressed as a witch, riding a broomstick through the night sky. That mysterious voice, the one only Lambda and Kairi could hear, told her that this Nightmare was a _Spellican_.

 _"I wonder if that voice is a connection between me and Kingdom Hearts, like Lambda has? Can other Princesses hear it?"_ At least, that's what Kairi tried to wonder aloud, but it came out sounding like a haunting violin melody. _"Huh?! What?"_ This time it was cymbals crashing. Clearly, something was extra-screwy about this Sleeping World.

Oddly enough, Sora seemed to actually hear the instruments coming out of Kairi's mouth. He looked right at her, shrugged in confusion, and sped up, only to have to jump over a meteor that came flying backwards along the rail. He lost some speed, and the Spellican laughed at him from far ahead.

Kairi decided to make the best of the situation. After a few stumbles and sour notes, she found she could make whatever sounds she wanted as long as it was orchestra music, so she started performing an upbeat encouraging tune to cheer Sora on. It seemed to work, too; Sora managed to catch up to the boss, at least, smacking the monster off the starlit road and into a more manageable arena.

For such a ridiculous-looking and scrawny monster, the Spellican was no pushover. It could call down flaming meteors and star-shaped projectiles, summon squads of little walking brooms that could all cast simple spells, and turn its own broomstick into a giant laser sword. Even with all that firepower, though, it was no match for Sora and his...balloons? The big orange balloon produced by Sora's Balloonga spell drifted over to the Spellican and exploded with enough force to stun the boss, and then it split into a bunch of smaller balloons in many colors that curved back around and burst on the boss one after another - a self-contained combo with ridiculous damage output. Sora cast Balloonga three times, which would be enough for any lesser Nightmare, but the Spellican somehow held itself together and teleported away.

Sora then called out his chubby but adorable _Meow Wow_ Spirit companion, which sucked in a mighty breath that drew his other Spirit, a _Thunderaffe_ , into its mouth. The Meow Wow grew ridiculously large, and Sora rode on its back as it began repeatedly jumping up and down on the Spellican, releasing massive shockwaves with each bounce. Looking on from above, Kairi cringed as the attack just kept going and going. The Spellican didn't stand a chance; it was destroyed only partway through the attack, but it took a few more bounces for Sora to calm his Spirit partner down.

Sora got off the Meow Wow as it finally shrank down to normal size and the Thunderaffe reappeared beside it. "Great work, Mr. Fuzzers! That should do it." The Meow Wow (he named it Mr. Fuzzers?!) made some happy noises and vanished. Sora gazed up directly at Kairi, but he didn't seem to be trying to make eye contact. "Mission complete, right, Neku? And I bet Mickey's okay now, too. Also, thanks for cheering me on, Kairi. You're here watching over me, right? I'll be done with these tests and get back to you soon." Sora closed his eyes and vanished into a different part of this Sleeping World, outside the inner world of the music sheet.

 _"So he did figure it out. Hey, wait, how come he gets to talk normally?"_ A symphony of woodwinds replaced Kairi's indignant huff. _"Well, at least he's doing well for himself, right? ...Wait, did he say 'Mickey'? What's Mickey doing in...*yawn*..."_ The dream faded into the calming piano music coming from Kairi's mouth.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Riku side] Symphony of Sorcery: Bald Mountain..._

 _Xion's dream..._

Xion dropped into Riku's dream, just like before. This time, he was standing on a rocky crag right in front of a volcano. On the rim of the volcanic crater was an unfamiliar boy in a Black Coat, but it wasn't hard to guess his identity: The stranger's silver-gray hair and golden eyes were a dead ringer for Xehanort.

"So you were waiting for me again?" Riku called.

The boy replied with all the smugness and sliminess Xion remembered from Xemnas. "Yes, for the Keyblade's chosen one. It was yours first, right? And now, because you fell to Darkness, it's only yours last."

Riku smirked at the transparent attempt to stir up jealousy. Perhaps in another life, this would be a sore point for him, but the Riku here and now had greater self-confidence. "Sure, but the fact that I got one at all means I clawed my way back out of the Darkness and stomped it back down behind me."

The other boy sighed. "Indeeeeed. I don't know how you did it, but you really have found a way to trap Darkness in the pit of your heart. Thus, our attempts to possess you failed. A potential vessel who's immune to Darkness is of no use to us."

"Meaning what?" Riku coaxed. This was the part where the villain reveals his evil plan, right?

Xion, with her absorbed anime knowledge, knew better. _"Oh boy. This is the part where the villain attempts to dispose of a pawn who's outlived his usefulness. The key word being 'attempts'."_

Sure enough, the young version of Xehanort (because who else would tack so many E's onto "Indeeeeed"?) raised his arms and proclaimed, "Your abyss awaits." Right on cue, the volcano erupted, spraying lava and burning rocks everywhere that obscured the view long enough for the villain to disappear.

From the molten spray emerged a giant demon with skin blacker than charcoal and eyes that glowed a frightful yellow. Xion actually recognized this entity, Chernabog, from Sora's memories, since he had fought this thing along the way to Ansem's Kingdom Hearts a year ago; perhaps it originally came from this world before it fell to Darkness.

Tense, frightening orchestra music swelled from nowhere as the battle began, but Riku didn't seem surprised, so Xion decided not to question it.

Chernabog wasn't the kind of enemy that could be fought on foot, since it stayed halfway inside the impossible-to-climb volcano at all times. Luckily, this was a dream world, so Riku could just decide he could fly, but he opted to simply fall sideways...with _style_! Xion cheered Riku on as he pushed against Chernabog's waves of pressure and dodged waves of fire and ghosts, but she wasn't expecting someone to notice.

 _"You there. You're Xion, right?"_ Behind Riku, a transparent version of himself appeared and floated over to Xion's presence in this dream. This other Riku looked a bit different, though, due to his long hair and skirt.

Xion took a second to get over her surprise, but only long enough for Riku to weave around another swarm of ghosts. _"That's me, all right. And you must be the other Replica. How can you see me?"_

The Riku Re...no, just Replica, scoffed. _"I don't need some special ability to do that. We're both parts of his dream that shouldn't be here, after all. You were there in Monstro when I first appeared, too."_

As Xion nodded in comprehension, Riku scored a strike on Chernabog while falling sideways at terminal velocity.

 _"But didn't you have a body of your own back then? What happened?"_

Replica shrugged. _"That body was part of the sleeping Prankster's Paradise, not my own. Right now, I'm in a similar situation to Namine."_

 _"Huh. Namine's really looking forward to seeing you again, by the way. I wonder if there's a way to get you two bodies of your own, though..."_ While Xion was puzzling through the possibilities, Riku landed another hit. Deep cracks had appeared along Chernabog's torso, and it looked like just one more blow would do the trick. Chernabog sent up a bunch of pillars of fire from below, and a few of them passed right through Xion's and Replica's ethereal forms.

Riku called out, "Replica, it's nice that you apparently finally met Xion, but I kind of need to focus!" He spun in midair to shake off a clingy, life-sapping ghost.

 _"Yeah, yeah, I'll wrap this up. It was nice meeting you, Xion. Hope your training's going well."_ Replica flew back to Riku, but before merging back into him, he yelled, _"Dark Burst!"_ and emitted an explosion of Darkness that scattered a wave of ghosts and snuffed out some floating fireballs without harming Riku.

With the obstructions cleared, Riku slammed into Chernabog one last time, causing the demon to dramatically wave its arms over its head and roar as it sank back into the volcano and evaporated into smoke just as the background music hit a climax and started to faded out. "That's three strikes - you're out! Time to go help Mickey and finish this test off for good. The last Sleeping Keyhole's been a crazy ride." Riku floated up into the air and burst into a spray of colorful music notes.

 _"...What?"_ Before Xion could figure out what Riku was talking about or where he went, the dream faded.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[The Training Worlds] Inn Name Only..._

Kairi and Xion woke at almost the same time, sat up in their beds to face each other, and immediately compared their experiences.

"Aw, how come you got to talk normally?" Kairi pouted after Xion's recap.

Xion retorted, "Are you seriously questioning dream logic? To be fair, I couldn't talk directly to Riku, only to his Replica...named Replica."

 _"Well, at least we know Replica will be able to return to the real world with Riku, the same way I'm with Kairi."_

Kairi nodded. "Right. I've been meaning to ask you, Namine...is it hard, not having a body?"

Namine thought hard about it. _"Hmm...I can say for sure that it's better than not existing. Never being lonely is nice, too. But it's also true that I miss being able to feel physical things. I can't taste the food you eat, or sink into a soft bed when you do, or slice through the Heartless with your Keyblade. If I didn't speak up every once in a while, it would be like I'm not here at all. And I can always feel this...pull, to just let go and sink into your heart for good, but I've been able to resist it easily so far. Still, I'm worried. Maybe I wasn't supposed to exist as a Nobody, but I'm definitely not supposed to exist this way. It can't last forever. And the same has to hold true for Replica."_

Xion decided, "Then...we should find a way to get you a body of your own. Preferably without straining Lambda's Observation any further."

Namine hesitated. _"...If you'd asked me back before we fought Xemnas, I would've said no. All of you have stable relationships with each other and your loved ones, and I would just end up a third wheel...or a seventh wheel, caught between Kairi, Sora, Roxas, Xion, Riku, and Lambda. I don't trust myself to deal with that...because that feeling is how I ended up doing what I did at Castle Oblivion."_

Kairi pressed, "But...? You said that would be your answer back before we beat Xemnas and came here. What changed?"

There was a long silence, but Kairi and Xion could practically _hear_ Namine blushing. _"Well...if Replica can come back too, then there will be a place for me. He promised to protect me. His own promise, not just a lie I forced on him. I know he's looking forward to the day he can make good on it. So I have to be there to meet him. I...still don't know how, though."_

*Ding, dong!* _"Guests currently staying Room 601: the guests staying in Room 666 have requested to see you."_

"Huh, I didn't know there was a P.A. system in the lobby." Xion shrugged and stood up, changing her shirt to read: _"I Got It Memorized. Thanks For Asking."_ She and Kairi made their way to the lobby, where Lea, Hazama, and Lambda were waiting.

Lea joked, "The sleeping beauties awaken! Did you two have more of those weird dreams Hazama mentioned?"

Kairi nodded. "Define 'weird'...but yeah, they really were. Here's what we learned, though..." She recapped her dream and Xion's.

Lambda noted, "Riku said that was the last Sleeping Keyhole, right? That means the boys should be almost done with their Mark of Mastery exam by now! We should ask Roxas if it's okay to go meet them when they get back."

Xion nodded. "Good idea, but first, how did it go with getting Terumi off the hook from your Observation?"

Lambda grinned. "I did it! I also disentangled myself from Roxas while I was at it. Still, what Mu-12 said about me makes me think it's still not safe to go get myself killed."

Hazama pointed at Lambda and announced with all the flair of a game show host, "And the award for Most Obvious Conclusion goes to..."

"...Touché."

"Well, let's not waste any time!" Kairi created a save point and vanished into it, leaving the green swirl behind for the rest of the team to follow her.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _The Training Worlds: Hub..._

Everyone appeared back in the Hub, but for once, Roxas wasn't there to greet them. There was an iridescent bubble of magic in the middle of the room, though. There were a couple other changes to the room, too. Directly across from the team, another door had been unsealed. This one was labeled:

 _Training World 5:_

 _Arena Pillar_

Also, the door to Roxas' personal training room was closed and locked. "What's going on?" Kairi wondered.

"It looks like Roxas left the Training Worlds in a hurry once I stopped Observing him," Lambda deduced. "Something must have happened in the real world."

"Then we should go back, too! The rest of the training can wait. Xehanort was involved in those dreams - Sora might be in danger!" Kairi ran to the bubble and vanished into it.

"Yeah! We're strong enough now to help out. I do want to come back and finish later, though." Xion followed after the leader.

"Darn right I will; I haven't managed to summon my Keyblade yet! I hope this is all a misunderstanding..." Lea jumped into the bubble.

"Either way, this is a welcome break in the routine. You coming, Lambda?" Hazama moonwalked out of the Training Worlds the same way he came in.

"Affirmative." Lambda swallowed any lingering doubts that she hadn't quite fixed her initially abysmal skills and stepped through the bubble.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: What?! No battle arena? #KH3HasProblems_

 _Unfortunately, Xehanort won't wait around at the cusp of completing his sinister plot until Team Kairi finishes all the sidequests and minigames. At least, not when he hasn't been paying attention to what they've been up to..._

 _Rest assured, the remaining three Training Worlds are still going to be explored._


	13. Wake-Up Call

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 13: Wake-Up Call**

 **-"All of the Pieces Are Destined to Appear."-**

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: We interrupt your regularly scheduled Training World to bring you a special announcement..._

 _Remember, X-Blade equals χ-Blade._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Realm of Light] Mysterious Tower: Changing Room..._

Kairi exited the magic bubble and immediately noticed that Roxas was there in the room with her, staring intently at the bubble. "Roxas, what's going on?"

Roxas grimaced. "If you guessed 'Sora's in trouble,' you're right. I would've set off to help, too, but Merlin convinced me not to go without Xion. Wouldn't want to push the distance too far for my Observation."

"But...weren't we in different worlds pretty much the whole time we've been training?" Xion asked as she stepped out of the bubble and leaned against a wardrobe.

Roxas shrugged. "Yes, but if you think about it, all those worlds fit into Yen Sid's dressing room. Anyway, once everyone's gathered, we're off to The World That Never Was. That's where Xehanort and his time-traveling selves have taken Sora."

"And here I thought I wouldn't have to RTC ever again..." Lea shrugged as he gave the bubble some extra room.

"Quick question, Merlin," Hazama addressed the old wizard (who was definitely still in the room, along with the Three Good Fairies), "what happens to the Training Worlds if we leave them alone for a while? I love the Beam Knives, by the way; such a thoughtful gift."

Merlin preened his beard for a bit at the compliment, then answered the question. "Oh, yes, no need to worry. As soon as Lambda arrives... Shazammity!" Lambda had barely stumbled out of the bubble when Merlin's off-the-cuff spell caused it to shrink down into a much more manageable form: a thick leather-bound book with a gold bookmark sticking out of it. "There - your progress has been recorded. Simply open the 'Book of Training' and back up a bit, and the Training Worlds will be recreated just as you left them. Of course, you'll want to do that with an esteemed wizard such as myself around to maintain them; just drop by my house in Radiant Garden anytime you want to use this book!" Merlin abruptly vanished in a poof of magic smoke, taking the Book of Training with him.

"Ah, good to know," Hazama replied as though Merlin was still here, then tilted his head toward Lambda. "Another thing that would be good to know: did you cut me loose from the Observation at the same time as Terumi and Roxas?"

Lambda nodded. "Well, of course. Why would I hold onto that hefty load on my Observation capacity when the more likely threat has to be let go anyway?"

Hazama grinned. "Good to know, indeed."

"Another thing that would be good to know," Lea piped up, "is how we're going to reach Sora without Merlin here to teleport us. I mean, I can still use Dark Corridors, but it's...iffy."

"I can make the trip a little easier with a Gate Between," Lambda replied, summoning Elysium and pointing it where the Training Worlds used to be. "Let's go _before_ consulting Yen Sid. If Xehanort knew enough to catch Sora in the middle of his test, he must be watching this place. But given his tactics before...I bet he's not watching Kairi."

"So you're saying being kidnapped so many times might actually pay off?" Kairi arched an eyebrow. "Here, let me try that Gate Between thing from the book." Kairi summoned Destiny's Embrace and fired a beam where Lambda was pointing. A white-edged purple portal showed up in the middle of the room. "Yes, it worked! Everyone through - and bundle up; it's going to be a little Dark in there. My new outfit works for that already, thankfully." She pulled up her hood, letting the black kitty ears on it stick up.

"Black Coats, check!" Lea, Roxas, Lambda, and Xion replied at the same time. All except Lea summoned their Coats over their other outfits to punctuate the statement, and each pulled up their hoods.

"Heh, featherweights." Hazama strode through the portal without needing any extra protection, and the rest followed suit.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[The Realm Between] The World That Never Was: Round Room..._

The group appeared right in the middle of the Organization's meeting room, surrounded by its thirteen thrones. Eleven of the thrones were occupied by Black Coated individuals; three had their hoods off, revealing Ansem (the Seeker of Darkness), Xemnas, and Xigbar - none of whom should have existed in the here and now. The lowest throne held Sora, a year younger than his present age and wearing a red-and-black version of his clothes with a big white X across the shirt, and the highest throne only held an indistinct cloud of Darkness that seemed to have been frozen in time while gathering together to form...something.

Lambda scanned the room. "Scanning...advanced time magic 'Stopza' in effect. The caster must be an ally, or we'd be stopped, too. As for these guys - wait a minute..." She scanned them twice to make sure her readings were correct, and they were. "Half of them are new, blank Replicas! Xehanort must have been trying to bluff someone. Additional readings; Riku and one SS-tier enemy are here, but out of phase with space-time; I hope Riku's okay. That's a pretty advanced trick he's trapped in, and I doubt we can reach him until his fight is over. Lastly, Mickey is lying unconscious over there." She gestured to the side of the podium. "It looks like we still have a shot to totally mess up Xehanort's scheme. Let's get Sora out of here!"

Lea hefted Sora and Mickey like sacks of flower and dragged them back through the Gate Between, which then timed out and vanished behind him. His voice lingered after the portal disappeared. _"What am I, the group's designated kid-hauler?"_

Lambda smirked. "Now, it's time for some fun. The Stopza effect will time out in thirty seconds. New Option design finalized. Holo Option!" An Option that looked like Zexion's weaponized Lexicon appeared over Lambda's shoulder, hovered over to Sora's vacated throne, and created an intangible hologram of the unconscious Sora to make it look like he was still sitting there.

Kairi called out, "Everyone hide!" They hid behind various thrones just in time for Riku to appear on the podium with an oddly jerky effect. Riku looked a year younger, too, and he had an interesting symbol on the back of his white vest that reminded Lambda of the Heartless and Nobody Emblems. A quick scan revealed that Riku himself was currently a "Spirit," the nicer category of Dream Eater. How fitting, for the one DiZ said was destined to protect the sleeping Sora behind him.

"Mickey! Where are you?" The time-distorting sphere engulfing the room finally wavered and vanished, prompting Riku to glare up at the tallest throne. "You must be...Master Xehanort!"

The throne was now occupied by an old, _old_ man with Xehanort's distinct tan skin, yellow eyes, and silver hair - although the only hair left on his head was a sparse goatee. "Indeeeeed. All of this was decided. My twelve selves would welcome me here on this day, when I would return a complete person. It is the future which lies beyond my sight."

"Then why are you so confident? What are you even after?" Riku demanded.

Xehanort smirked his smug-est smirk and wound up for a long spiel. "Just as I always have, I seek the resolution to the oldest legend in the World: that of the Keyblade War! In ancient times, people believed Light was a gift from an unseen land by the name of Kingdom Hearts. Many sought to find that place and control its immense power, but Kingdom Hearts was safeguarded by its counterpart, the X-Blade. People forged many Keyblades in its likeness and fought each other, all hoping to acquire that one, ultimate key. Thus was Darkness first born in the hearts of people, and that Darkness swallowed the World. On that barren soil, Darkness prevailed, and Light expired. This much, at least, you have already heard.

"The violent clash that came to be known as the Keyblade War shattered the X-Blade into twenty pieces: seven of Light, and thirteen of Darkness. No one knows what happened to the original Darknesses, but the Light that remained was sheltered in the hearts of the first Seven Princesses of Heart, and from them, the World we know today was reborn as just one of many tiny worlds, forever isolated from each other. But the legend does not end there. In fact, the next page of the Book of Prophecies that revealed all of this to me is simply blank! I must know the next chapter of the destiny that awaits us all, for it has already led me perfectly to this very moment! To that end, I seek to gather seven pure Lights and thirteen pure Darknesses, re-enact the Keyblade War, reforge the X-Blade, and finally open the Door to Kingdom Hearts, which has stood sealed since time began! Then, at last, I will truly know all that there is to know."

Riku took a moment to wade through the exposition, then narrowed his eyes. "...Okay. Let's say you really have been trying to gather seven Lights and thirteen Darknesses all along, including during all those other plans you or your fragments have tried. That would explain why Maleficent was trying to find the Princesses of Heart, but I bet you'd be just fine if my friends and I took up Keyblades to fight you now...because this new Organization XIII you've recruited must be your thirteen Darknesses. The old group must have been meant for that, too, but you failed. Sora stopped you at every turn."

Xehanort nodded slowly. "Perceptive...you have learned much at Maleficent's foot, I see. Then you know that even if you wish to avoid a Keyblade War, my Organization will still seek out the Princesses of Heart and claim their hearts, forging the X-Blade unopposed. Choose to guard the Princesses, and we will have you, the Guardians of Light, as the Lights we need. The destined time will come, be it fast or slow."

The old Keyblade Master stood from his chair and summoned an ominous gray and black Keyblade, designed more like an axe than a key, with a familiar blue demonic eye set in the tip of the blade. Hiding behind a throne, Lambda's scan labeled it the **Gazing Eye**. Xehanort proclaimed, "But first, the thirteen Darknesses must be united! All of the thrones have been filled...and now, the thirteenth vessel shall bear my heart like the rest!" With a flick of his hand, he caused the throne behind Riku to rise up to the level of his own.

Riku watched as Sora's sleeping body was pulled up out of his reach, and realized Xehanort's intentions. He summoned his own Keyblade, **Way to Dawn** , and tried to leap straight up to the chair.

Ansem, who had been merely watching this entire conversation, suddenly flash-stepped into Riku's path, grabbed his head, and slammed him back to the ground. Xemnas also made himself ready to move, but his golden eyes flicked around in confusion, expecting another attempt to rescue Sora that hadn't happened.

"No! Sora! Rrgh!" Try as he might, Riku couldn't get away from Ansem's grip.

"Heh heh heh..." With an evil chuckle, Xehanort weaved his fingers over his Keyblade in arcane patterns, then pointed it straight at the X over Sora's heart. From the tip of his Keyblade fired something that looked like a freed heart: a fragment of Xehanort's own heart, containing just enough willpower to cement his control over the weakened and sleeping heart of Sora.

The heart fragment streaked unimpeded across the room...only to pass right through Sora and splash against the back of the throne, disappearing into nothingness. "What?! Impossible!"

The hologram of Sora flickered and vanished, revealing the Holo Option, which also disappeared in a flash of light. Lambda stepped out from behind one of the blank Replicas' thrones. "Ha! Made you look, Xehanort! Was _that_ in your so-called Book of Prophecies?"

Riku's relief was plain on his face as he realized what had happened. As confusing as it was that Lambda apparently had Zexion's weapon now, it was clear that the odds of this fight had been in their favor from the start. On that note, he dismissed Way to Dawn briefly, re-summoned it in a reverse grip in his other hand, and slashed at Ansem to force the Heartless to back off. "I have no idea what's going on, but am I glad to see you, Lambda! You're just in time!"

"Just far enough ahead of time, actually," Kairi corrected him. "It's good to see you again, Riku. Don't worry, our new friend took Sora and Mickey to safety."

"That 'new friend' is Lea, by the way, but you and I know him better as Axel," Roxas mentioned as he also revealed himself.

"Ta-daah!" Xion jumped out from behind another throne, wearing a T-Shirt that read, " _Team Kairi: 1, New Organization XIII: 0_ ". Her Impact hammer appeared and flew at Xemnas, who was just about to start moving. The hammer swung at his head and forced him to defend himself with an energy wall rather than try to attack the newcomers.

Hazama moonwalked out from behind yet another throne. So many easy hiding places in this room... "Well, I'll be damned! If Lea could've made it back in time, we'd actually have you crusty old shits outnumbered."

Riku started, "Hazama?! But wait, there are twelve of..."

"Only six," Lambda interrupted. "I would have liked to take one of these blank Replicas, too, but we've lost the element of surprise."

Roxas pointed Oathkeeper at the top throne. "So, are you going to try and fight us right here and now, Xehanort? It would be ruin that plan of yours if anyone were to die here. Or do you want to quit while you're behind, let us go, and finish _actually_ uniting your Darknesses?"

Xigbar slammed his hands on his throne's armrests. "Grr...You've really done it now, you old coot! Now we're out of time, there are too many of them to handle, and if we don't get out of here _now_ , the whole plan's screwed!"

Xehanort grit his teeth, but finally nodded and sat back down. "...Indeeeeed. We will retreat for now. But make no mistake - all of the pieces are destined to appear: your seven Lights, and my thirteen Darknesses. Let us finish this at the fated place...the Keyblade Graveyard!"

Xigbar smirked. "Yeah, that'll do. Go ahead and ask your King where that is, kiddos; I fought him there once upon a time. Be good boys and girls, now!"

With sinister chuckles all around, the new Organization XIII vanished from the present time altogether.

"...Phew." Riku wiped some sweat from his brow; he'd gone into that mess way more tense than he ended up needing to be. "Now can someone please tell me what the heck just happened?!"

"It'll probably be better to bring the discussion back to Yen Sid's tower," Kairi replied, creating another Gate Between. "Great work, everyone! Yes, even those of us who only got to taunt them." She led the way back to the Mysterious Tower.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Realm of Light] The Mysterious Tower: Sorcerer's Loft..._

Yen Sid stood up as a Gate Between opened in front of him and everyone filed through. "Ah, it is good you have returned. Lambda, Xion, Kairi, Lea, Hazama, and Namine...or perhaps you prefer to be collectively called Team Kairi? I must sincerely congratulate you. You have snatched Sora back from Xehanort's clutches, forestalled the coming Darkness, and returned to us safe and sound. However, there is still the problem that Sora has fallen into a deep slumber...one from which he could not normally wake."

Kairi gazed longingly at Sora, who was slumped against the wall next to Yen Sid's crescent-shaped window. (He had spontaneously returned to his normal age and outfit when he left The World That Never Was.) "Then...how can we help him?"

"You? You cannot. You lack a specific power that is needed." Seeing Kairi start to tear up, Yen Sid continued, "However, Riku _does_ have this power - the Power of Waking. By unlocking the seven Sleeping Keyholes in the Realm of Sleep, he has surely gained the power to awaken a heart from its slumber."

Riku (who was also older again now that he'd come back to the tower; perhaps The World That Never Was had been dipped into the Realm of Sleep for Xehanort's plan?) started to object, but then blinked and came up short. "Sure, except how do I actually - never mind, I guess I _do_ know how."

Mickey, who had awoken earlier and been too flabbergasted at the diverse crowd in the room to speak up, did so now. "But Riku, Sora's heart is down in the darkest abyss! If you dive in after him, you might not come back out!"

Riku shook his head. "I know, but this is something I have to do. Right before that young version of Xehanort took Sora away...he called out to me for help. And besides, just look at him! I told him to take care of Kairi, and this is the _second_ time he's ended up sleeping on the job!" He grinned playfully. "You see, it's my job to keep him on his toes."

"I'll go with you!" Mickey offered. "I took this test way back in the day, when Master Yen Sid wanted to learn if it was possible. I... _think_ I remember how to use the Power of Waking."

Yen Sid slowly shook his head. "And perhaps you still can, Mickey, but you must admit Riku stands the better chance."

"Even so," Lambda piped up, "I wouldn't let you go it alone again right after we finally met up! Take this with you, so the rest of us can at least cheer you on. Comms Option!" She summoned her movie projector Option and set it to hover behind Riku's back.

"What's this? And...why are your eyes purple?" Riku asked, turning around and watching the Option doggedly follow his movements.

"It's my new Drive ability: 'Option'. Now I can make flying drones like this, with as much variety as I can dream up, like that Holo Option from before. I'll run you through the list later. As for my eyes...it's a long story, but I'll tell you as soon as we have time."

Kairi added, "And here...a little insurance from my own newfound Drive. I'm having trouble coming up with a name for it, though. 'RE: Fill', maybe?" She extended her hand toward Riku and surrounded him briefly with a glowing pink aura of Light Armor, which sank into his skin and made him want to stand a little taller. "There you go - a little Light to protect you in the Darkness. Take it to Sora, okay?"

"Okay, Kairi. I promise I'll bring Sora back, safe and sound!" With that, Riku summoned his Keyblade and held it out in front of him. A round, pink object appeared between him and Sora; it looked like a sphere of glass covered in uniformly placed spikes. Riku closed his eyes and dissolved into Light, which trickled into the newly-created _Portal_ and vanished into Sora's heart. Riku's final test had begun.

"Comms Option! Setting up the video feed...confirmed!" Lambda summoned a second copy of the Comms Option. The projector spun up and shone a flat screen on the wall. Yen Sid waved his hands and dimmed the ambient light in the room to make it easier to see the action unfold.

"I've never wished harder that I could summon popcorn," Hazama remarked as everyone settled onto the floor to watch.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Dive to the Heart: Tag 30 Soras!_

The screen showed Riku (in his Spirit form) free-falling into an abyss of cloudy Darkness, streaking past floating stained-glass images of memories from Sora's adventures. As he fell, he passed dozens of clones of Sora floating in midair. All the outfits Sora had worn on his adventures were represented among the clones. Riku angled his fall to collide with as many as he could.

Suddenly, a Sora made entirely of pitch-black Darkness appeared. the Anti-Sora's glowing yellow eye-spots focused on Riku, and it extended an X shape formed of dark lightning to block the diver's path. Riku rolled in midair to gracefully dodge the obstruction, then lunged Keyblade-first through the Anti-Sora, defeating it. He then went back to gathering normal Sora clones at a leisurely pace.

Hazama had just started to yawn at the unfortunately slow-paced action when one of the collected Soras caused a reaction further down: a glowing ring of Light stretched across Riku's path, and he fell right in, completing the Dive and touching down inside Sora's heart.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Station of Awakening...?_

Riku thought he'd end up on a stained-glass pillar - wasn't that how a Dive to the Heart would normally work? But the place he ended up was just a slimy, black pit of Darkness, walled in by more, equally slimy Darkness. "Did I make it? W-whoa!" The Darkness under his feet suddenly swelled up, prompting Riku to jump backwards. From the bulge, a figure covered in the black ooze emerged.

The Darkness slowly sloughed off the newcomer's form, but it wasn't very recognizable afterward. All Riku could see was a fully covering suit of menacing black armor, wielding a pitch-black version of the Kingdom Key in an odd reverse grip. Right over the armor's face-concealing visor, an emblem Riku had grown quite familiar with was stamped. This thing was an evil Dream Eater: a Nightmare.

Mickey, watching on Lambda's screen, mused, "A Keyblade held in a reverse grip, and that armor...it's got to be Ven!"

"Ven?!" Lea exclaimed. "I met him once; the guy who looks just like Roxas. THAT'S where he went?!"

Namine realized, _"So he's the other heart inside Sora - the sleeping one even I couldn't fully read."_

"Scanning...target identified as...Sora? Adjusting...oh, it's just the armor that's been corrupted. Target ID: _Armored Ventus Nightmare_. Threat level: S. Speed: S. Physical and magical attack power: A. Defenses: A. Riku, you have to break through that armor to save Sora!"

 _"Lambda? You can talk to me through this thing? Well, okay, here goes nothing."_ Riku readied his Keyblade, and the battle began.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Defeat the Armored Ventus Nightmare!_

Immediately, the AVN sank into the Darkness again. Riku tracked the bulge it created on the floor, but keeping an eye on a small black blob on an equally-black background was tough. He managed to head off its movement and be there when it arose, putting up a Dark Barrier around himself to block the sneak attack it was clearly going to try. However, the three dark globs that rose up with the Nightmare went right through Riku's barrier and knocked him into the gloopy wall. "Ghh-! Take this!" Riku charged forward with a diagonal spin attack coated with Darkness, which did as little damage as he expected, but the followup spin charged with Light definitely hit hard.

"I can't fight you with Darkness, huh? Well, that's fine. Voltico, let's go!" Riku summoned one of his Dream Eater companions: an _Electricorn_ , which was exactly the electricity-themed unicorn one would expect. The Spirit immediately dissolved into a ball of oddly bright Darkness that fused with Riku, empowering him with greater speed and an electric charge over his Keyblade. He proceeded to clash with the eerie armor at lightning speed. Lambda's Option did its best to keep a view of the action, but she had to give up and settle for hovering it over to the side of the arena.

The next time the Armored Ventus Nightmare plunged into the Darkness, it didn't move or come up right away. The black walls and floor turned stark white, though everything was still coated in disgusting slime. Purple blobs of Darkness rose up all over the arena, prompting Riku to dodge like mad. His Link Style timed out, slowing his movements back to normal, but he compensated with a dodge move his peanut gallery had never seen before, briefly turning himself into a bolt of Darkness and zipping forward. By keeping up these Dark Rolls and quickly changing directions, he evaded all the swooping globs. Voltico wasn't so lucky, though, and Riku swapped it out for another Spirit before it could be broken down into Dream Pieces. "Bat-Bat, tag in! Let's finish this like we started it!" A colorful, bat-like _Komory Bat_ appeared in Voltico's place.

Out in the audience, Roxas chuckled, "He named it 'Bat-Bat'?"

"Ribbiteus and Kraygon, you too!" A short, froggy, yet highly dangerous _Lord Kyroo_ and a large, winged, equally dangerous _Ryu Dragon_ joined Bat-Bat at Riku's side. Meanwhile, the dark mockery of Ven was holding still and seemed to be tightly focused on Riku's position. Glowing crosshairs appeared on Riku's chest, which he took as a cue to get moving.

"I sure hope this is possible...everyone, let's try a Trinity Link!" All of Riku's Spirits (which he had made sure were fully charged for a Link Style before fighting Young Xehanort) dissolved and merged with him at once. "HRAAAAGH!" Riku began glowing brightly (with a pink tinge from Kairi's "insurance"), lifted into the air, and vanished as the AVN created a massive ball of Darkness over its head. When Riku reappeared in the middle of a blindingly fast lunge attack, a smaller ball split from the large one and intercepted his path. Riku knocked it away and teleported to another angle, rushing faster and faster to see whose ultimate attack - the ancient Keyblade Masters' _Shotlock_ technique or Riku's newly-invented Trinity Link - would run out of steam first.

Lambda pointed at the crosshairs on Riku."I want to figure out that thing the Nightmare just did."

"It seems to work like my Ragnarok," Xion noted.

Unfortunately, one of the deflected balls of Darkness was accidentally sent careening straight into the Comms Option, and the screen outside Sora's heart was immediately left awash in static. Hazama groaned. "Damn, right when it was getting good!"

Kairi gasped, but Mickey reassured her, "I'm not worried. Riku will win for sure!"

"But we have no clue if just beating that thing will be enough to save Sora," Kairi insisted.

Lambda waved that concern aside. "If there's more than that to this Power of Waking, then he'll figure it out. You saw how quick he is on the uptake back in the _Round Room_."

Kairi took a deep breath and calmed down. "...You're right. I still wish we could help, but all we can do right now is pray."

Hazama rolled his eyes...which were still closed. "I don't do the whole praying thing."

Goofy (was he here the whole time?!) wondered aloud, "Well, what else could we do while we wait? Have a tea party?"

"That's not a bad idea!" Donald quacked. "Here, I'll use my magic!" The Royal Magician raised his Mage's Staff, shouted, "SHAZAM!" and summoned a round tea table and three chairs, with no food or drink in sight. "Aw, that's all?"

Yen Sid chuckled. "Allow me." With a series of arcane gestures and a vibration of his conical hat, he not only summoned a very long, rectangular table, piled high with various cakes and teas, but also enlarged the entire room to accommodate it (though the Mysterious Tower seemed unchanged from outside). The old Master groaned as he sank back into his own chair and summoned his own tea. "If, as I fear, my tower is about to become the base of operations for the upcoming clash against Xehanort, then I suppose I will need to redecorate."

"Why are we celebrating before Riku even gets back?" Lambda asked incredulously, only to find that all the others were already seated and sampling the tea and cakes.

"Because we feel like it!" Donald declared.

"Yeah, what he said!" Goofy agreed.

Xion waved Lambda over to an empty chair. "C'mon, live a little! We just totally humiliated Master Xehanort in his moment of glory; that's got to be worth _something_."

"I'm worried, too, but you don't want to go back to training on an empty stomach, do you?" Kairi asked while wearing an odd mustache-and-glasses prop she'd found next to her plate.

"Well, I can't argue with _that_." Lambda settled down and tried her tea. "Ooh! It's still super hot, but what an interesting flavor! I guess this is 'bitter', huh?" Then she took a bite of chocolate cake and seemed to short-circuit. "Gzz - SWEET! Oh my various gods, it's so delicious!" After that, her plate was cleared in seconds. "Chocolate is the best thing ever!"

"I knew that would get her attention." Kairi smirked as she sipped her tea...but then found out that careless tea-drinking could invite a spill. "Ah, that's hot! Cure!" Kairi cast a weak healing spell, causing the pain to subside - and causing the stain to vanish from the front of her new dress. "Neat, this outfit cleans itself with Cure magic!"

Suddenly there was a thump from the other side of the room. "Kairi, is that you...? H-huh?! When did so many people get here? When did _I_ get here? Where is 'here'? Am I back at Yen Sid's tower? Did I pass the test?"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, one question at a time, Sora! By the way, my name's Hazama. I stopped by to pay Lambda a visit and get some Observation issues sorted out, but she convinced me to stick around. The details are probably _way_ over your amusingly spiky head, but that's the gist of it."

Kairi patted an empty chair beside her. "C'mon over, Sora. I'll tell you all about the training we're doing over tea."

Xion realized, "Wait, if you're awake, then why hasn't Riku returned?"

Sora felt over his chest. "He's...still doing something in there. I saw him beat that thing in my dream, but now that I'm awake, I'm not sure..."

"This whole mess hurts my head!" Donald griped.

Lea reminded everyone, "He'll be okay. He's a tough guy. Chances are, he's just smashing some giant monster into paste."

"Axel?! You're here, too? What _happened_ while I was asleep?"

Kairi corrected, "No, no, his true name's Lea. Roxas helped him come back and called him here to join our training, and he showed up just in time. But let's start at the beginning..."

Ten minutes and twelve chapters of recap later, Riku finally reappeared, facing the same wall as when he'd vanished and holding both the Kingdom Key and a roll of paper in a glass bottle. Sora's Keyblade vanished and was replaced with Way to Dawn, which then disappeared, and Riku turned around to behold the utterly ridiculous scene playing out in Yen Sid's study. "Sora, you're already awake? And...why are you all having a tea party?"

"Riku, you're safe!" Sora launched out of his chair, leaving behind a pair of mustache glasses, and glomped Riku with a big hug as though Sora was five years old instead of fifteen.

Riku blinked and tried to stand up. "Wait, don't we have this backwards? I was the one trying to save you!"

"YOU'RE SAFE, RIKU!"

Riku gave up trying to push Sora off and just clutched his head. "Ugh, never mind. Are you okay? Everything back to normal?"

"Normal" and "Sora" didn't belong in the same sentence, but he pulled back a bit and nodded. "Yep, never better! I could see what was going on in my dream, and I could hear your voice the whole time."

"I'm going to get jealous at this rate," Kairi grumbled.

Hazama snickered. "Don't kid yourself, Princess. You knew what you were signing up for, dating a friend-crazy blockhead like him."

Kairi pouted a little longer, then shrugged. "...You're right, I did. Now, are we going to have to rehash the whole story again for Riku?"

Namine volunteered, _"I'll handle it. Riku, you might want to lie back a bit."_

"Huh? Why - WHOOOA!" Riku suddenly got the whole story copied to his memory, physically thumping him against the wall. "Ow...but at least I know what happened now. As for me, I met representations of Roxas, some guy who looks like Roxas, and Xion in there, answered their weird questions, and then I met a sort of data copy of Ansem the Wise. He gave me this, saying it was data he'd compiled that he hid inside Sora." Riku presented the letter bottle, uncorked it, and slid the paper out...only to find it was wrapped around a small memory drive. "Huh? What's this?"

Lambda recognized the flash drive for what it was. "Oh, thank goodness! I was worried that this timeline hadn't invented solid-state memory yet! As for analyzing it, I bet Ansem's computer in Radiant Garden would be perfect for the job."

Lea winced. "Aw man, Even and Ienzo were the tech gurus among Ansem's apprentices. I'll have to go back and face them now, won't I?"

Riku took a moment to work through the anagrams, then realized why Lea/Axel would be hesitant about working with them. "Suck it up; worst case scenario, they're probably not going to fight you."

 _"Especially since I still have Zexion's power,"_ Replica added, manifesting himself in the D-Mode suit, which was more his than Riku's by now.

"I _still_ have questions about that," Lambda replied, "but it's great that you're back, Replica. Er, in a manner of speaking."

Namine manifested as well, with her hands clasped nervously in front of her. _"Hello...I'm glad we can meet again. I meant to thank you before, for keeping your promise."_

 _"Don't mention it. I just wish we'd managed to snag a couple of those blank Replicas so we could meet without the whole gang here."_

Xion giggled. "We are sort of a gang by now, aren't we?"

Hazama countered, "More like a gaggle. Or a flock. Or a murder."

"Or friends," Mickey added.

"Yeah, what he said," Sora finished.

Yen Sid cleared his throat. "All right, I daresay this tea party has run its course." The whole tea set vanished, dumping everyone who was still seated onto the ground. "Gather in front of my desk, everyone. It is time to announce the results of your tests."

Everyone scrambled (or in Hazama's case, swaggered) into loose groups such everyone had a view of the desk. The old Master himself sank into his chair, shut his eyes, and took a deep breath before finally addressing the group. "First, I would like to apologize to Sora and Riku. This ordeal was necessary to unlock the Power of Waking, which will surely be required in the coming days, but I underestimated our enemy's cunning and left you vulnerable to Xehanort's deceptions. I am quite grateful that you both managed to return from the abyss of dreams unharmed."

Sora asked, "So, did we pass the test?"

"You both performed truly admirably, that much is clear. This ordeal has revealed many hidden truths, and now we must gird ourselves for the clash with Darkness that awaits us. We must gather our seven Lights to fight back against Xehanort and his thirteen Darknesses, lest he instead target the Princesses of Heart and cause all Light to be lost to the worlds."

Hazama interjected, "Can we just talk for a minute about how stupid the word 'Darknesses' is?"

Lambda giggled. "I wasn't going to say it, but...referencing...wow, it's actually a real word."

"Yeah: a real stupid word," Lea joined in. "How clever can Xehanort really be? We totally hoodwinked him back there."

Xion remembered, "He mentioned something about that. I almost missed it, but he said he learned everything that got him obsessed with this Keyblade War business from a 'Book of Prophecies'. Yen Sid, does that ring a bell?"

Yen Sid had been exasperated that his test results had been hijacked, but this really was serious news. "...It does. That book supposedly contains a complete and accurate record of all events that have yet to happen. According to legend, it was written by the first Keyblade Master in the age of fairy tales, a man known only as the Master of Masters. If Xehanort truly does possess even a fragment of it, or a copy of the original text, that would explain the uncanny preparedness he displayed during the test...and it would also explain why his plan fell to pieces at the moment Lambda intervened."

Lambda recalled, "He did mention that 'the future was beyond his sight.' I'm not sure if his text only covered up to the time he was recompleted, or if I actually altered the future somehow."

"Then chances are still pretty good that we'll win in the end, right?" Xion pointed out.

Yen Sid gravely replied, "...No. The last words written in the Book of Prophecies are well-documented: 'On that barren soil, Darkness shall prevail, and Light expire.' I doubt that passage could be misinterpreted."

Hazama's ever-present smirk slipped off his face. "Wow, talk about a downer."

Kairi firmly shook her head. "But it doesn't say 'The End', and there are more blank pages. So I still have faith."

"Then we should focus on stopping the rest of Xehanort's plan," Riku decided. "He said he needs seven Lights and thirteen...Darknesses...to forge this X-Blade thing, right? But he's still missing _seven_ of his..." He broke off into a laugh. "Sorry, couldn't keep a straight face."

Yen Sid considered this. "With many Replicas at his disposal, Xehanort could no doubt fill his ranks with other time-traveling hearts. In particular, the previous Organization XIII was full of apathetic, immature, and frustrated individuals who could easily be turned to Darkness. Whether he can muster all seven missing pieces that way remains to be seen, however. After all, several of those members we know to have been recompleted, so other versions of themselves could not occupy Replicas via time travel. Even Master Xehanort must follow the same restrictions on time travel that I do, most likely to keep his Book of Prophecies accurate." Yen Sid glared sideways at no one in particular...he was probably thinking about Merlin's feat of blatantly disregarding said rules.

Lambda took up the conversation. "So what about our Lights, then? Assuming we just need Keyblade wielders fighting on our side, we have Riku, Sora, Mickey, myself, Kairi, Xion, and we _are_ going to save those three Keyblade wielders Yen Sid mentioned before we started training...and Lea's working on his. So if we can get everyone on board, that's already TEN Lights. As long as we all survive to the final clash, we'll screw up Xehanort's X-Blade recipe by default!"

Hazama quipped. "You gotta do the cooking by the book! Take it from anyone who's eaten Noel Vermillion's death dinner."

"Who?" Sora asked.

Hazama deflected, "Never mind. Nothing I just said was important."

"Oh. Okay, I believe you."

 _"What, just like that?"_ Replica was bewildered.

Riku affirmed, "Just like that. Surely you know what Sora's like."

Yen Sid coughed to get the group back on task. "Now that we have some measure of hope for the coming battle, it is _at last_ time to announce the results of Sora and Riku's test for the Mark of Mastery."

Everyone immediately came to attention. "Both of you performed your task, and unlocked all seven Sleeping Keyholes..." Sora and Riku perked up. "...However, one of you braved the Realm of Sleep a second time to unlock another Keyhole and save a friend." Yen Sid pointed at Riku. "Riku, I hereby name you...our next true Keyblade Master!"

Riku blinked dumbly, as though even after everything, he still couldn't believe it. "Me? I'm a...Keyblade Master?"

Sora, unexpectedly, was happy that Riku passed the test, rather than being upset that he himself apparently flunked. "Way to go, Riku! I knew you were gonna pass with flying colors!"

"Gee, Sora, you're kinda acting like it's you that passed," Goofy pointed out.

Roxas asked, "Isn't 'Keyblade Master' just a word? Sora didn't need to be a Master to save the worlds over and over again."

"There are some unique abilities associated with the title," Master Yen Sid explained. "Your Keyblade will instantaneously become even more powerful, and a powerful binding skill is now yours to wield."

"Also, you can make everyone around you _mad jelly_ , because now you're a Keyblade Master and they're not," Hazama added.

"...He's not wrong," Lea muttered.

Lambda sauntered over and kissed Riku's cheek. "So, I guess I'll be calling you 'Master Riku' more often, after all. You did great, dear!"

Riku smirked at her. "Well, I sure hope so. Do you know how many Organization-level bad guys I had to beat up in a row right before you saw me again? FOUR. Well, three, but Ansem counts twice because then he turned his Guardian into some giant blob thing and hid inside it."

"I don't know why anyone expects turning into a giant monster will do anything more than turn them into a huge target," Kairi wondered. "Terumi tried that, too."

Riku slumped. "I still can't believe Terumi showed up again and tried to mess up your training. I should've been there to help."

Hazama snickered, "You should've; he was _delicious!_ Or maybe that's just a BlazBlue thing."

"Maybe not," Riku mentioned. "You all seem to have discovered some pretty cool new Drive abilities like the kind people have in the Azure Timeline, and I figured mine out, too! I call it 'Dark Eater'; consume the Darkness, return it to Light. It made fighting that armored Nightmare thing a cinch, since any time it hit me, it powered me up. It works when I use my own moves, too, and I'm not sure there's a limit."

"Don't push yourself too hard," Lambda cautioned him. "Kairi's a special case, but anyone else runs a risk of corrupting their soul if they overuse their Drive too much, too fast. That's why I only let myself use two Options at a time right now, why Xion doesn't always have her weapons equipped, and why you shouldn't try to eat a hundred Heartless at once. As for Hazama..."

Hazama finished, "Yep, it'd be an apocalyptic disaster if I let the Black Beast go berserk. But since I _am_ the Azure Grimoire, wouldn't that just be me? I'll play it by ear and see if there's more to my powers I didn't catch in the millions of years I've been around. After all, Terumi was in control for most of that, and we've seen that he's just absolute shit at creative thinking."

Lambda asked Hazama, "So you're sticking around, even though you're not tied to my Observation anymore?"

Hazama gave her a thumbs-up. "Duh! Things have just started getting interesting with the Xehanort situation, and then there's the battle arena and the other two stages we left behind in the Training Worlds, and then there's checking out these Ansem apprentices you mentioned, and _then_ I can find out if just hanging around and being friends is worth doing when there aren't any Armageddons in the picture. I'll be sticking around for a while."

Riku gave him a thumbs-up back. "Good. I never thought I'd say this, but after what Namine showed me, I think I can trust you to not cut Lambda to ribbons when I'm not looking."

Hazama snarked, "Truly, this is the highest praise I can expect from the boyfriend of the robot girl in question."

Xion asked, "So, now that we've got all the important exposition out of the way, what's next for us? There's a lot to do. We have to find those three missing Keyblade wielders, keep an eye out for Xehanort, finish the Training Worlds, Sora needs to re-unlock the Power of Waking, and now there's this encrypted data Riku brought back. Who's doing what?"

"We should form teams," Kairi put in. "Team Sora will be Sora, Donald, Goofy, Jiminy Cricket, and me. And of course, Namine will be with me."

Jiminy bounced up onto Sora's head. "Thanks for remembering me! I spend so much time in Sora's hair, it almost feels like I just disappear! But don't worry, I'll record everything that happens! Er...I will when I get a new Journal. We've already filled up both the ones I had! I'll figure something out."

Kairi nodded. "We'll go with Sora and get him back up to snuff. Sora, don't think I didn't notice that you've lost a bunch of power again."

Sora remained stubbornly chipper. " _Again_...well, whatever! Happens all the time. But how can I get it back?"

Yen Sid offered, "There's someone who lost his strength and found it again...a true hero you ought to pay a visit." Sora realized who the old Master was talking about, and did a few comically manly flexes to imitate Hercules. "If that fails, then traveling to many worlds as you have before will surely provide the needed experiences. Perhaps you may never make a complete recovery, but it is absolutely essential that you at least master the Power of Waking, for without it, Ventus' heart will never return to where it belongs. Donald, Goofy, Kairi, I leave Sora's safety in your hands."

"Don't you worry, Master! We'll be right with Sora, just like always!" Goofy saluted.

"You can't go off and become a Master without us, Sora!" Donald joked.

Sora grinned. "I wouldn't dream of it, guys. Although, speaking of which, there's one last thing I needed to do in the Sleeping Worlds. Can this wait until I get back?"

Kairi nodded with a warm smile. "Go ahead, Sora. While you're out, I'll finish the Training Worlds with the rest of Team Kairi. But take this with you, so you'll be sure to come back!" She handed him her homemade promise charm once more, which she had kept safe in her Pouch of Holding this whole time.

"I promise, Kairi." With a quick hug and kiss, Sora and Kairi parted ways.

Roxas took up the discussion. "Team Roxas will be Lea, Xion, and me. We'll finish up the Training Worlds, and then we'll get started cracking...let's call it Ansem's Code, and try to get the other ex-Organization members on board with all this."

"And that leaves Team Riku: Lambda, Mickey, and myself, at least. Replica will be with me. After Lambda finishes the Training Worlds, we'll try to track down those missing Keyblade wielders. Mickey, what do you know so far?"

Mickey hesitated. "I'll tell ya while Lambda's in the Training Worlds, Riku; it's a _long_ story."

"As for me," Hazama finished, "I'll do what I do best: sneak around unfamiliar worlds and dig up the 'new' Organization XIII's dirty secrets. Don't worry about teaming me up with anyone; it would be a pain to keep a whole group up to my stealthy standards."

Yen Sid made a few dramatic gestures. "Good, then our course is decided. The preparation phase begins now. I will arrange to transport Team Kairi to Merlin's house in Radiant Garden; a simple matter of teleporting my tower to a nearby location and redirecting the Ghost Train."

Lambda audibly choked; Yen Sid considered that a _simple matter_? She reminded herself that Yen Sid was perhaps the only sorceror in existence who could call himself a peer to Merlin the Wizard. Before she could properly frame the thought, though, she, Kairi, Xion, Roxas, and Lea were teleported out to Yen Sid's front lawn, with his purple, star-spangled Ghost Train ready and waiting beneath an unfamiliar spread of stars. Team Kairi, minus Hazama, climbed aboard and let the self-conducting train take them to Radiant Garden.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Radiant Garden: Merlin's House..._

Merlin was, of course, completely unsurprised that Team Kairi was back to dive into his "masterpiece" so soon. He'd even invited the Three Good Fairies over to ensure it worked. Merlin placed the Book of Training on the floor and opened it with his magic, causing the shimmering magic bubble to spring back out.

Kairi addressed her team, "You four go in without me. Before I get back to training, there's something I want to ask the fairies."

Lambda shrugged. "Sure thing. Don't take too long, though; the time dilation might mean we have to wait a really long time to sign up at the Arena Pillar."

"Not to worry," Merlin assured, "The time dilation effect will only begin once I decide to let it."

"Then that's settled," Xion grinned. "Last one in's a rotten egg!"

"Hey!" Kairi complained, since this made her a rotten egg by default. The others piled into the bubble before she could say anything further, so she let it go and turned back to Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather. "Anyway, I was wondering if you had any way to..."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: ...I'll just let you keep guessing what Kairi wanted to ask until the next update._

 _The post-Xehanort exposition really dragged on, huh? This chapter ended up being surprisingly long, but luckily it practically wrote itself once I kicked my various muses out of bed and actually got started._


	14. One Dream to Another

**Asleep at Dawn**

 **Chapter 14: One Dream to Another**

 **-"It Looks Like I Have to Go to Sleep Again."-**

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: ...And now, back to our show!_

 _This is the last chapter of Asleep at Dawn. I used to have a plan to drag this out longer, but there's a reason I call myself The Unplanner. However, it's also one of the longest chapters I've ever written, even after skipping some of the filler parts that would just be boring.  
_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _[Training Worlds] Hub..._

Once everyone got through the bubble, Roxas got down to business. "Okay, you know the drill: a new door is open. However, the 'Arena Pillar' through this door is actually part of Midnight Town. You might have seen it while you were flying around."

Xion scoffed, "How could I miss it? It's huge!"

Lambda asked, "So to get to the next world, we have to fight our way to the top?"

"Not quite," Roxas replied. "There are onehundred floors in the Arena Pillar, each with a specific set of enemies to battle before you can move up to the next floor. Bosses appear on every fifth floor; some of them are new Heartless types Merlin cooked up, while others are copies of humanoid villains and giant monsters you might have already fought. At the top, you can fight the mysterious Champion, and if you win, you'll get powerful Keychains that Merlin commissioned the Moogles to synthesize for each of you. However, to access the next Training World, you only need to get halfway up the Pillar and defeat the boss of Floor 50."

Lea took a step back. "That still sounds pretty rough!"

"What sounds rough?" Kairi asked as she rejoined the group.

Lambda started to reply, "Roxas was just telling us about - whoa, what did you do to your hair? It's gorgeous!"

Kairi flipped her now hip-length, shiny red hair over her shoulder and let it stream down her back. "Like it? I kept cutting my hair short to keep it clean while playing on the beach, but while I was on the run from Axel - no offense, Lea - I noticed that getting tossed into a wall in Twilight Town hadn't messed up my hair at all. I just asked the fairies about that, and they say it's another Princess of Heart thing: their world's Princess, Aurora, woke up with perfect hair after the curse of eternal sleep placed on her was broken.

"Since there's no need to worry about messing it up, I wanted to try having longer hair, but I don't want to wait for months even after this whole crisis is over to grow it out, so I asked the fairies if they had any magic hair products I could use to speed up the process. Luckily, they just got some magic shampoo from Cinderella's Fairy Godmother - it seems like all the old magic folks know each other. So, that's what I've been up to. Can anyone fill me in on this next Training World?"

 _"I'll handle it,"_ Namine volunteered.

"Hold on, just let me sit down...okay." Kairi sat on the floor and braced herself for Namine to copy and transfer the relevant information from Xion's memory. "Ah. It sounds pretty simple, if a bit time-consuming."

Xion joked, "Hazama would probably be bored to tears." She took the opportunity to change her T-shirt's slogan: " _HERE COMES A NEW CHALLENGER!_ "

"True enough," Roxas agreed, "But without him, you'll have to rely on your own strength. Which leads me to the catch: all those new Drive abilities you've acquired will be heavily suppressed in Lea and Kairi's case, and completely disabled for Lambda and Xion, inside the Arena Pillar. You'll have to fight with just your Keyblades and magic. Kairi will have to keep her Light to herself, though she can probably still cast lots of Light spells, and Lea will be slightly less powerful with fire than he was in the Organization. Lambda and Xion will be unable to summon any of their unique weapons and drones."

Lea grinned to hide his worries. "Oof. I might actually _need_ to summon a Keyblade for this one!"

Roxas nodded. "That's the point. Good luck, everyone. I'll just be over here...vivisecting Merlin's best copies of various Xehanorts."

Lambda deadpanned, "Tell me again why you haven't just hopped over to the Keyblade Graveyard and preempted Xehanort's whole plan?"

Roxas shrugged. "Because I'm not quite _that_ strong yet. I can take two-to-one odds against these mindless clones, but I'm pretty sure fighting the whole new Organization XIII at once is still way out of my league."

"Even so, the rest of us have plenty of catching up to do," Kairi pointed out. "We'd better get started." She marched over and opened the next door.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Arena Pillar: Floor 1..._

The arena they found themselves in (which would become a very familiar sight for the next few hours) was a perfectly round, flat room that could precisely fit the arena of Olympus Colosseum inside it, corner to corner. The ceiling rose about thirty feet up, giving plenty of room for aerial enemies to swoop around while remaining in range of most common spells. The whole structure was apparently made of sandstone, but it was completely indestructible in that arbitrary way only video game materials and Merlin's magical constructs could be. Golden magic circles glowed on the walls, uniformly illuminating the room and blocking unauthorized teleportation into or out of the arena.

Team Kairi appeared in a diamond formation, with Kairi at the front, Lea and Xion on the left and right, and Lambda at the back, facing off against a horde of twenty Shadows across the room.

Lea summoned his dual chakrams, _Eternal Flame_. "Right into the thick of it, huh?"

Kairi summoned **Destiny's Embrace** and jumped into the fray, doing a flip in midair just for style before obliterating the first enemy in one strike as she landed. "Just Shadows? It's like we're playing on Beginner Mode."

Xion summoned **Forget-Me-Not** and joined the fray at a leisurely pace, swatting aside three more Shadows with her longer Keyblade. "Remember, there are at least fifty floors to work through. We should take it easy while we can."

"I've got your 'easy' right here! Jump, everyone!" Rather than summon **Elysium** , Lambda pointed her prehensile hair forward and fired her Braid Beam, sweeping it across the entire group and destroying all sixteen remaining Shadows in one attack. Kairi and Xion managed to hop over the beam like a deadly jump rope. "Our Drives might be locked down, but Roxas didn't say anything about our bonus items."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 2..._

Suddenly, the group found themselves back in their original formation on the second floor. No flashing lights or puffs of smoke, no sound effects, no loading screen - they were dumped straight into the next battle. The enemy set this time was a group of floating spellcaster Heartless of various types, all flying at different elevations to lessen the impact of exactly the sort of tactic Lambda had just used.

Kairi sighed. "So our bonus items still work? Good for you, I guess. My new outfit just amplifies my Drive, so it's not going to be much help here."

"Yeah, and improved armakinesis isn't so helpful when I only have one weapon to work with. Well, we needed to work on our fundamentals anyway. Gravira!" Xion's spell squashed most of the Heartless out of the air, leaving them as easy prey for her and Lambda to destroy with good old-fashioned melee attacks.

"You're selling your ability short, Xion!" Lea hurled his chakrams at the remaining few floating Heartless, using armakinesis to guide the spiked disks to each target. "And you shouldn't count me out, either! Got it-"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 3..._

"-Memo...rrgh." Lea gave up on finishing his catchphrase in favor of zipping behind one of the three new _Large Bodies_ and spinning his flaming chakrams into its back. "Good, that move still works. Hey, you three should try wrapping your Keyblades in magic like this! After all, it worked for Sora. I still have nightmares about that Blizzard Raid of his. What was I supposed to do about a sleight of 27 anyway...?"

Lea trailed off into nonsensical rambling as Xion put his advice into practice, imbuing her Keyblade with Thunder magic and throwing an ad-libbed Thunder Raid at the second Large Body. The Keyblade itself bounced harmlessly off the Heartless' jiggly belly, but the magic around the weapon discharged as a massive thunderbolt at the moment of impact, destroying the rotund monster anyway.

"I've got this one!" Kairi jumped, air-dashed with Lambda's copied Ars Magus trick, and then twirled through the air in a manner reminiscent of Sora's Master Form. With this extra-long triple jump, she landed behind the last Large Body, allowing her to deliver a nasty combo to its defenseless back. She dragged the Heartless forward and into the air with a rising spin attack and then knocked it down hard, destroying it. "How's that?"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 4..._

"That combo's definitely worth keeping," Lambda appraised. "These basic Heartless are getting boring, though." She faced down the new platoon of _Armored Knights_ and destroyed them with one sweep of her Braid Beam. "Let's just skip to the first boss."

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 5..._

 _Defeat the Goliath Armor!_

"Well, here we are, just like you wanted. Feeling a little regret?" Lea shakily joked, staring up at the first boss.

Lambda calmly scanned the massive, silver-painted enemy. "Scanning: Target name: _Goliath Armor_. Threat level: B. Physical power: A. Magical power: D. Defenses: C. I'm not particularly worried - it's basically a _Guard Armor_ , but bigger. We could destroy the limbs, but that would just drag this fight out. Getting enough altitude to attack the _Goliath Gauntlets_ and the weak spot on the head of the _Goliath Torso_ might be tough, though. I can fly up there with my Glider, but I don't think I can cast enough spells to finish it off by myself."

Kairi came up with a plan. "Then let's attack the _Goliath Hammerlegs_ first, and force the rest of it to come to us!"

"I'm on it!" Calling on her memory of Sora's fighting style, Xion executed a slick Sliding Dash to close in on the boss' massive left boot. She got in a few clean hits before the rest of the party caught up to her, but then they all had to hop backward to avoid the heavy stomps caused by the Goliath Armor simply wandering aimlessly around the arena, along with the tall but close-ranged shockwaves each step created.

"Firaga!" Lambda followed the fireball she cast back into the fray, dealing noticeable but negligible damage to the Goliath Armor's left Hammerleg with both that and a couple Keyblade strikes, before being forced to retreat from another stomp. "Those shockwaves are probably supposed to stop us from climbing on its feet."

Kairi grinned. "Well, too bad for it. Bind!" A yellow field of static spread out beneath the leg in question, preventing it from rising back up.

Unfortunately, this trick actually warranted the boss' attention. With a bestial roar from somewhere inside its helmet, the Goliath Armor bent over and sent its massive silver fist down at the party, forcing them to scatter in all directions. The other Goliath Gauntlet then came flying right at Kairi.

"I've got you!" Equipping her Keyblade in its Glider form, Lambda swooped across the path of the attack and snatched Kairi to safety before rising high into the air with the Princess in tow. "Let's take the fight back to it!"

Xion called out from below, "Don't worry about us! We'll be fine...I think!" She dodged another giant punch with a hair's breadth to spare.

"Better than fine! Check this out!" The Bind spell holding the boss' leg down faded, but Lea jumped on top of its pointed toe as it rose again, then leaped from there onto the retreating Goliath Gauntlet. "The old Organization's agility training really paid off! Firaga!" Lea dropped a fireball at his own feet, mangling the armored fist he was standing on and launching him even higher into the air with the force of his spell's explosion. Lea surprised himself when he felt the burn from his own fire for the first time - his immunity to fire had been reduced with the rest of his powers - but he kept his wits about him.

"Here, grab on! Cure!" Kairi grabbed Lea's wrist as he rose; her hand glowed green with healing magic to fix the burns on Lea's legs. Lambda was momentarily jostled by the extra weight, but managed to right herself.

Lea grinned. "Nice catch! Now hurl me at that thing's ugly face!"

Both girls did double-takes. "What?!"

"You heard me! Quick, before it can punch at us again!"

"Well, if you say so..." Lambda swooped toward the boss' helmet, grabbed Lea's wrist away from Kairi...and with a mighty YEET, she sent the spiky-haired pyromaniac flying right into the opening of the Goliath Torso's visor.

Despite the visible glowing eyes, it turned out that the interior of the Goliath Armor's head contained nothing but smoky, immaterial Darkness. Now that he was inside the boss' head, Lea shouted, "Let's do some redecorating!" He proceeded to toss Firagas in every direction, creating bumps on the helmet one after another as the metal dented outward. The glowing yellow eyes of the Heartless faded out of sight, right before Lea clambered out of the Darkness under its visor. He gave the helmet a kick for good measure, causing the boss' head to fall from its body and clang lifelessly against the floor right in front of Xion. Lea jumped out into thin air as the rest of the Goliath Armor was wracked with explosions and vanished, limbs and all.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 6..._

Team Kairi was faced with a gang of four _Morningstars_. Lea wiped his brow with the back of his hand. "Phew, good thing I didn't need to land on my feet after that!"

"That. Was. AWESOME!" Xion gushed.

Lea took the compliment with a cocky grin. "I know, right? 'Off with his head!' and all that."

"Absolutely. But it looks like we're back to boring battles for a while, I guess." Lambda sighed and cast Magnera to immobilize the large, spiky Heartless, allowing Kairi to finish them off.

"Holy!" ***PSSSEEEEEEEWWWW!*** All four Morningstars were obliterated by a beam of Light from above.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 7..._

"Thank goodness; I was worried that spell wasn't ever going to work again, after Terumi and the Gigas Possessor both just shrugged it off." Xion summoned her Keyblade to deal with the _Wizards_ in the next room.

Lambda shook her head. "You're misinterpreting your anime tropes. Super-moves don't just stop working; the enemies you're fighting have to get tougher or change their innate properties instead." For example, her Braid Beam's non-elemental damage easily destroyed the Wizards, who would have absorbed elemental attacks to heal themselves.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 8..._

 _Win the boring battles!_

...They won.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 10..._

 _Defeat the Veil Lizards!_

Kairi mused in response to the voice only she and Lambda could hear, " _Veil Lizards_ , is it? I don't see them anywhere."

Lambda readied her Keyblade in its **Petal Blades** form. "That's their gimmick: camouflage. Riku and I fought one before, and there are three of them in this room somewhere. Look for the telltale wavy-air effect."

"...Found them!" Kairi pointed her Keyblade at one and cast a spell, but failed to specify the name of the spell she wanted. Apparently as the default response, a dodgeball-sized globe of Light popped out of her Keyblade and homed in on the Veil Lizard she was pointing at, then bounced off it to home in on the other two. "Wait, what spell was that? ... _Pearl_? Okay, good to know. And easy to use!" Kairi cast several more Pearl spells, which the other members of her team used to gauge the bosses' locations and launch their own attacks.

Xion noted as she hacked away at one of the bosses, "Once you track them down, there's not much else to them, is there?"

"Not quite. They also have homing laser eyes and a tongue attack." Lambda blocked one such tongue attack and sent the offending limb right back to clonk the Heartless' own head, dazing it. She followed up by skewering the hapless lizard from all sides with her Petal Blades, and then cast a basic Fire spell from all eight of them simultaneously, roasting the boss from the inside out.

Lea wiped away a single manly tear in honor of the fiery carnage. " _*Sniff*_ I'm proud of you, kid." He tore into the last Veil Lizard with his chakrams, spinning them like burning buzz-saws, but the boss simply refused to die until it could finish charging and firing its laser eye beams. One of them struck Lea before the team could move on.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 11..._

Lea scrubbed his eyes, but couldn't clear the dark spots in them enough to see the next enemy set. "Gah, I can't see! Is there a spell to clear off status effects like this?"

Kairi shrugged. "Probably. Heal? Refresh? Purge?" Nope, those guesses did not turn out to be magic words.

 _"According to my old Panel Grid, the spell you're looking for is called 'Esuna', actually."_ Namine informed her Other, speaking up for the first time in a while.

Kairi blinked in surprise, then cast the spell. "Seriously? No wonder I couldn't just guess it. Esuna!"

Lea blinked one more time and readied his weapons. "Ah, that's better. Thanks, Namine!"

 _"You're welcome."_

Meanwhile, Lambda and Xion were competing to see who could finish off the most _Air Soldiers_ , and they were so close to clearing the whole set that no one else needed to join in. Xion crowed, "Ha! The final score's 17 - 8! Too slow, Lambda!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 12..._

 _Win more boring battles!_

"...Acknowledged," Lambda grumbled to both Xion and the voice.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 15..._

 _Defeat the Trouble Brewer!_

"Magnera! Firaga!" Lambda's one-two punch caught the familiar boss from Lotus Academy just as it was about to throw its first potion, igniting the volatile mixture and destroying the oversized punk-chic Wizard with its own explosive. "Target terminated. I certainly wasn't going to let him get away again!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Skip a few..._

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 20..._

 _Defeat the Darksides!_

"I feel like the boss battle difficulty here just took a step backward," Lambda muttered as she cast a few Firagas and toasted the nearest of the three Darksides, which slumped over backwards and died, just like that.

The other two went down with just as little trouble thanks to Xion's high-jumping combo moves and Kairi's Holy spell. Their smoky remains drifted upwards...coalescing into a new boss!

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Defeat the Eye of Darkness!_

 _"Above us!"_ At Namine's urgent warning, Kairi craned her neck back to gaze upward. A giant, slit-pupiled red eyeball formed of pure, slimy Darkness, gazed back down at her, filling the whole ceiling with its pitch-black sclera. Its gaze flitted from one puny humanoid to the next, seeing not their faces but their hearts. Suddenly, a purple beam shot down from the massive pupil and traced a curving path that everyone had to dodge. Then another beam blasted a seemingly random trail, then another _five_ beams fell...it just kept firing with no pauses.

"How do we even fight that thing?!" Lea scrambled away from one beam, only to skid to a stop as another crossed his path.

Lambda scanned the new boss while staying on the move and recharging her spent mana. "Scanning... Target name: _Eye of Darkness_. Threat level: A. No physical attacks - physical power defaults to D-tier. Magic attack: S. Defenses: B. No specific resistances detected. The whole thing's a big eyeball to poke out, but it'll take quite a few hits to destroy. The problem is going to be finding ways to actually hit it up there on the ceiling."

"Holy!" ***PSSSEEEEEEEWWWW!*** Unfortunately, the beam originated _from_ the ceiling, meaning it missed the boss completely. Kairi fell to her knees and screamed at the evil ceiling, "Why, trope? _WHY!?_ "

Even if she was acting silly, Kairi wasn't stupid about it; the fist she was shaking at the heavens suddenly materialized her Keyblade to deflect an incoming beam when the boss tried to capitalize on her apparent vulnerability. She got back up and dusted off her legs, recharged and ready to rejoin the battle.

Xion just shrugged in response to the whole exchange. "Well then...Blizzara!" The chunk of ice she launched from her Keyblade hit its mark and tore into the eyeball, splashing goopy Darkness onto the floor below...and Shadows started to rise from the puddle. "No. Stop that." Xion swept her Keyblade through the puddle, burning the Darkness away with her weapon's Light.

Lambda dashed in with a wide slash to wipe out the Shadows that managed to spawn, then equipped her Glider. She flipped upside-down and launched herself feet-first at the ceiling, weaving around another beam attack as she flew. "Take this...! Pearl! Pearl! PearlPearlPearl..." She drove her right leg deep into the slimy Darkness, then repeatedly cast her newly-learned Pearl spell from both feet until she ran out of mana. She drifted back to the ground as bouncing orbs of Light wreaked havoc all across the Eye of Darkness. "Damage assessment: Moderate damage inflicted. This strategy should remain effective."

Kairi raised her Keyblade and launched her own Pearl barrage, dancing around a beam as the boss returned fire. "Alright, let's give it everything we've got!"

Xion joined in with basic Blizzard spells, going for quantity over individual shot damage, while Lea rapid-fired a short stream of Firagas at a separate area. Meanwhile, Lambda turned her attention to culling the Shadows that spawned after each hit.

As the team's barrage of magic was just starting to peter out, something ruptured right under the surface of the Eye of Darkness. The whole surface of the eye began to quiver as Light spurted from rapidly-forming fissures in the sphere. Finally, the whole thing burst, splashing everyone with its gooey remains.

"Ew ew ew ew-"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 21..._

 _More battles!_

Luckily, the sludge was left behind by the teleportation, so Kairi immediately stopped doing the Face-Splatter Dance and got back to fighting. Four more floors were conquered without incident.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 25..._

 _Defeat the copy of Xaldin!_

"Where's the fun in this?!" A carbon copy of Xaldin stood on the other end of the room, ready and waiting with his trusty dragon-themed lance (which looked more like a spear), _Lindworm_ , in his left hand, two extra copies of it in his right, and three more dancing around him in pockets of wind.

"Good question," Kairi puffed in reply to Xaldin's recorded opening line. "I'm starting to get tired..."

"Then I'll handle him," Xion volunteered. "Just stay as far back as you can; his range with those lances...spears? Whatever they are, he can jab really far with them."

Lea stepped in front of the Replica. "Hey, _I_ was the Organization's assassin, remember? Being ready to terminate any of the other members was literally my job, and I was darn good at it...well, except with Roxas, and that's just because he was hiding a completely different fighting style the whole time I knew him. You should all just sit back and watch a professional at work."

Xion shrugged and stepped back, keeping her guard up. "Okay, _you_ handle him, then, Lea."

"Wind, guard me!" Xaldin raised his Aero barrier and began slowly walking forward. Lea summoned his chakrams and mirrored Xaldin's pace.

"Bad move." Lea threw a flame-covered chakram and parked it over Xaldin's head, allowing the flames to get caught up in the swirling winds and cook the unfortunate lancer with sheer heat. Xaldin was forced to leave his barrier behind when he teleported out of danger, lest the fiery whirlwind follow him.

"Enough!" Xaldin leaped high into the air...and then he simply stayed up by the extra-high ceiling of this boss room, flouting the law of gravity with his wind powers and sheer jumping ability. While he was out of reach, the ex-Number III attempted to throw lances down on Lea's head in several groups of increasing size. Watching for the telltale gusts of visible wind where each lance would fall, Lea hopped and skipped out of the way, while jumping over the shockwaves sent out when each one struck the ground. All six lances then swirled around Lea, trying to goad him into holding still, but the instant they warped back into their owner's hands, the assassin rolled aside and successfully dodged the final massive stab as Xaldin finally dove back down.

Lea immediately zipped right back over to Xaldin and drove his spinning chakrams into the copy's back. "Too slow! Better luck next time, buddy!"

"Take this!" Xaldin began an all-out series of spinning, breakdancing attacks, starting with two lances and adding more in pairs, until he was spinning all six lances end-to-end to mutilate everything within twenty feet of him. Unfortunately, Lea had done his research on Xaldin's Limit Break as well, and he simply skipped backward to lead the lancer-dancer away from the rest of Team Kairi. Lea almost got backed up against the wall, but Xaldin's rushdown ran out of steam right when the redhead thought it would.

"Still too slow! Maybe you need a ride to catch up," Lea suggested, knowing all about Xaldin's finishing move.

"Axel...!" Xaldin jumped into the air, sending his lances beneath him in a line. As they flew, they grew and transformed, until Xaldin stood at the head of a serpentine dragon that circled the arena.

Lea warned, "Everyone get in the air! Go as high as you can!" Lambda nodded, summoned her Glider, and dragged Xion and Kairi up to the ceiling. "Good. As for me..." Lea's emerald eyes widened as he got an idea. "Here goes nothing. Heh heh, 'Nothing'." His chakrams vanished in bursts of flame, and he held his right hand out in front of him. ***Froosh!*** Another burst of flame heralded the appearance of a Keyblade in his hand!

"You'll wear the face of despair!" Xaldin readied his attack: his lance-dragon's head split open three ways and charged up power, then released a blast of cutting wind toward the center of the room as the dragon swiftly circled the round arena's perimeter, a much deadlier variation of a move he'd tried against Sora over a long, straight bridge. Lea was caught right in the middle...

"Reflect! Reflect! Reflect!" With his new Keyblade, Lea was able to cast other spells besides Fire, allowing him to weather Xaldin's storm with a magical barrier. He cast the same spell multiple times to be sure his defenses would outlast the assault. "Oh, one last thing, Xaldin..." The Reflect barrier shattered with a powerful explosion, but Xaldin wasn't close enough to be hit by it. Instead, Lea jumped onto the dragon before it could collapse into separate lances again, and impaled Xaldin through the chest with his Keyblade. "...I'm. Not. Axel. My name is Lea! _Got it memorized?_ "

With no reply aside from a pained scream, Xaldin dissolved into a swirl of wind, carrying thorns of Nothing up to the ceiling. Lea turned away from the spectacle right before Team Kairi was teleported to the next floor.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _First Quarter Rest Area..._

As it turned out, there was a special room waiting for them now that they were a quarter of the way up the Arena Pillar. The _First Quarter Rest Area_ was decorated with bronze-colored furniture (which wasn't actually made of bronze, thankfully), including two comfy couches and a long table between them. Tall glasses of ice-cold water waited on the table for each contestant, along with a platter of crackers and cheese. The team all sank into the couches for a much-needed break.

Xion grabbed Lea's left arm and gushed, "That was amazing, Lea! You were in total control of that fight!"

Lea smirked. "Like I said, knowing exactly how to beat him was literally my job until just recently."

"And you finally summoned your Keyblade, too!" Sitting on Lea's other side, Kairi finally had a chance to admire the new weapon. Its hilt was shaped like one of Lea's/Axel's signature chakrams, and a spiked, red-and-silver Keychain connected it to a charm shaped like a miniature chakram without the red accents. The blade was like a jet of crystallized fire which constantly glowed with heat and Light from the inside. Rather than having skeleton-key teeth sticking out like most Keyblades, the end of the crystal flame hooked back around toward the hilt in an almost complete circle.

Lea scratched the back of his neck as he dismissed his Keyblade. "Y-yeah. Just in the nick of time, too. I actually couldn't have dodged that last attack with my ability to fire-port locked down."

"Lea, that's cheating!" Lambda suddenly stood up from the other couch and pointed an accusatory finger at Lea. (Some cracker crumbs fell from her chin to the floor, disrupting the intense vibe she was trying to project.)

Xion gasped. "Lambda, what's gotten into you?"

Lambda elaborated, "That's not a real Keyblade. He's just changed the shape of his chakrams, the way Xaldin did with his lances."

 _"How do you know that?"_ Namine asked.

Lambda pointed at her purple eyes. "You can't fool my scans. Still, it's a pretty convincing copy. I wouldn't expect it to hold up in a blade lock with the real deal, since it's not nearly as indestructible as a Keyblade should be, but it does have most of the bells and whistles real Keyblades do. With this, on top of casting spells, which you already demonstrated, you could free captured hearts from the Heartless, and even seal and release locks on doors and chests."

"Then there's no real difference when it comes to training alongside us," Kairi pointed out. "Although, if it was real, we would have heard a voice telling us the new Keyblade's name when it first appeared. Have you come up with a name for it, Lea?"

Lea shrugged. "Traditionally, Organization XIII didn't give names to the alternate forms of their weapons. It was part of the whole 'we are nothing' theme that Xemnas kept beating into our heads, although for some reason he let us name our weapons' normal forms. As for this thing, we can just call it 'Lea's Keyblade' or something like that until the real deal shows up."

Xion patted Lea's arm. "For what it's worth, I managed to get a lot of mileage out of a fake Keyblade myself. Don't beat yourself up about forcing it to appear early; just do the best you can until your real Keyblade appears...although I bet it'll only show itself after that one breaks." She tried to lighten the mood with a joke: "Above all else, you shouldn't even _think_ about fighting Riku with a fake Keyblade, trust me."

Lea sighed. "Don't worry, I've got your previous work in this field memorized." He took a big gulp of water and stood up. "So, are we ready to move on or not?"

Kairi stood up and stretched her arms over her head. "Just a second...okay, I'm ready."

Lambda nodded. "Affirmative."

Xion hopped to her feet. "Then let's go!"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 26..._

As soon as all the members of Team Kairi said they were ready, they were teleported into the next battle: _Wyverns_ and _Defenders_ and _Darkballs_ , oh my!

Lea slipped behind one of the two Defenders and used it as a practice dummy to get a handle on fighting with a one-handed blade rather than a pair of chakrams. He could appreciate the extra cutting power the new weapon afforded him, but he could tell his footwork was all kinds of wrong. If the enemy could actually hit him back here, he would've been done for, but he managed to destroy it before it could swing its shield around. He glanced over at Kairi for reference as she sliced up the other Defender, using her surprisingly good example to try to make his own stance a little less embarrassing.

Meanwhile, Lambda predicted the Darkballs' teleportation and tricked them into grouping up so she could defeat them all at once, Xion smacked down the Wyverns, and the battle was won in short order.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 27..._

 _Skip scene Y/N? Y_

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 30..._

 _Defeat the Volcanic Lords!_

Three of the same large Heartless waited here. Each one looked like a head and limbs stuck on an extremely fat lava lamp...with actual lava. Their stubby right arms gripped long staves topped with fiery meteor decorations.

Lea let out a heavy sigh upon seeing the obviously deliberate selection of fire-immune enemies. "Have I been doing too well with the other bosses? Is that what's going on here?"

Lambda shrugged. "I normally would've scanned these _Volcanic Lords_ , but their strengths, abilities, and weaknesses are just too obvious. And on top of that, it looks like I got their name anyway."

Kairi summoned her Keyblade and took aim at the one on the left. "Then let's just beat them and move on. Blizzaga!" Her target was wracked with violent jiggles, but held itself together and began to breathe fire. Fortunately for the challengers, it was too far away to actually hit anyone...but the fire breath left patches of lava as it swept along the ground.

The one on the right started to bounce around, belly-flopping in the team's general direction and leaving more lava patches as it went. Xion dashed right underneath it.

Kairi paused in her continued assault on the leftmost Volcanic Lord to gape at Xion. "What are you _doing?!_ "

"Watch this!" Xion held Forget-Me-Not straight up over her head, allowing the rambunctious Heartless to land on it. The boss' belly button got stuck fast to the tip of Xion's Keyblade, and she proved that for all its girth, the hollow Heartless was surprisingly light. She swung the boss around in a circle, dragging along one of its fellows, before letting them fly at the third one that Kairi still had occupied. "And there you have it: a picture-perfect 'Firagun'! Sora made up this move when he fought one of these things before."

It was too early to celebrate, however. Back then, Sora had used this move to throw a Volcanic Lord into a _Blizzard Lord_ , its ice-element counterpart. The tactic had never been tried on three of the same element, and the results were less than ideal: the three Volcanic Lords all fused together into one enormous Heartless that took up the majority of the arena! It looked exactly the same as the smaller versions, only _MUCH BIGGER_.

Lambda scanned the giant enemy as it ponderously moved from the side of the arena to the center. "Scanning...Target name: _Volcanic Emperor._ Its physical strength and magical abilities are greater than the sum of its parts, but its speed has dropped to match. If we don't stand in front of it, we should be fine." Of course, as she finished the report, she realized: "Oh crap, _I'm_ standing right in front of it! Reflega!"

The Volcanic Emperor breathed out, creating a tornado of fire. Lambda's spell protected her just long enough to lunge out of the affected area, but the vortex dragged her right back in. She screamed as the flames washed over her whole body. When the attack ended, Lambda was left on the edge of consciousness. The outfit Kairi picked out for her was ruined, leaving her in just her bodysuit.

"Curaga!" Kairi spent all her mana to heal Lambda. "Get up, Lambda! Hurry!"

"A-acknowledged." Lambda got to her feet and dashed counterclockwise as fast as she could, which turned out to be pretty fast. The boss spent a moment deciding whether to focus on Kairi and Lambda on its right or Xion and Lea on its left. "Sorry about the outfit, Kairi."

Kairi frowned to hide her worry. "You nearly burned to death, and _that's_ what you're concerned about? If you have time to think about that, then just keep fighting."

"At least we know exactly what's at stake if it hits us," Xion pointed out. "Kairi and Lambda might be able to repair their clothes, but Lea and I can't."

"Then let's just pop this thing into smaller guys again!" Lea jumped up to the Volcanic Emperor's arm and drove his Keyblade into its round, balloon-like belly. *POP-BOOM!* Just like that, the Emperor split into his component Lords in a blast of hot air. Lea peeled himself off the wall where he'd been tossed by the explosion. "Phew, my clothes are okay."

"Let's wrap this up quickly!" Xion imbued her Keyblade with Blizzard magic and tossed a Blizzard Raid that whacked two of the three Lords, then struck them again as the weapon returned to her hand.

"IDEA Engine, activate!" Lambda took advantage of her temporarily increased abilities to swiftly regenerate her mana. "I was just starting to like that outfit. This is for my dress, you jerks!" She equipped her Glider, zipped to the center of the arena, and spun in place as she sprayed Blizzard spells everywhere. The two Volcanic Lords that Xion had weakened began to puff up, bursting into crowds of pathetic little _Fiery Globes_ and patches of magma. As Kairi dove into the fray to clear them out, Lambda used the last of her IDEA Engine time to deliver a brutal dive-kick to the last Volcanic Lord, piercing straight through it. She landed with her Keyblade's normal form in hand as the boss exploded, and cast Thundaga to immediately wipe out the Fiery Globes its demise released. "All targets terminated."

For the next five floors, no one could get a move in because Lambda kept annihilating each group with wide-area Aero and Thunder spells. All her training in magic was finally paying off.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 35..._

 _Defeat the Dark Inferno!_

The team was faced with a single, vaguely humanoid Heartless. It stood taller then even Lea, and on top of that it was constantly floating in midair...which made the spinning wheels of solid whitish-purple fire beneath its clawed feet seem rather pointless. Its horned, purple head sported a jagged glower, and its muscular chest had a heart shaped section missing, letting one see all the way through its body. Oh, and it carried two huge swords with ease. Both blades were taller than Kairi and deadly sharp.

"And right when I ran out of magic, it's time to fight an obviously melee-focused enemy. I hope my swordplay's up to snuff. Scanning..." The large Pureblood Heartless dashed at her in the middle of her scan, hoping to break her focus by swinging its two giant swords. Lambda blocked one while Xion blocked the other, holding the boss at bay long enough to complete the scan.

"Target name: _Dark Inferno_. I'll skip the minutiae: it's just like an _Invisible_ on roller skates, aside from its ability to string more than one attack together. It'll get faster as we keep damaging it."

Xion grit her teeth and forced the Dark Inferno back, leaving it open for a combo. "I would've known what an Invisible does if you hadn't beaten them all so quickly back on Floor 33." Although, come to think of it, Sora had fought a few of those back in his first adventure, so Xion _did_ know what they were. However, she had never fought one herself, since her time in Organization XIII was cut short.

"Well, what can it even do if we keep it locked down like this?" Lea caught the boss in his own combo when Xion sent it tumbling away. Only two hits into the combo, however, Lea's Keyblade was repelled; the Dark Inferno crossed its swords to block before moving in for a counterattack of its own. Lea was suddenly forced onto the defensive.

"Got you!" Kairi joined the assault, driving her Keyblade into the monster's side as it charged power in its swords for what would've been an unblockable combo finisher.

By now, the Dark Inferno was clearly sick of being ganged up on. With a flash, its momentum and direction of movement suddenly changed, and it bounced all the way to the far end of the arena. Its swords began to glow purple as it powered up and grew faster, then it linked its weapons together, stuck the double sword into the ground, and spun around the makeshift pole, leaving a circle of purple fireballs behind with its flaming roller skates. Then it dove into a short-lived dark puddle and vanished, leaving the fireballs behind to do its dirty work.

Everyone found themselves surrounded by several fireballs that circled around them for a moment before rushing inward. Lambda cast Reflera at the moment of impact, Xion Dodge Rolled out of the way, and Lea took the hits and cast a passable Cure spell to heal himself.

For her part, Kairi nodded to herself and put something she'd read into practice. In a flash of pink Light, her Keyblade vanished and reappeared as a pair of folding fans styled like large flowers, white in her left hand and pink in her right. "It worked! These are my new **Dual Fans**!" With a graceful spin, Kairi created a tornado of wind and flower petals around herself, dragging the fireballs into circling around at _her_ command. When the Dark Inferno resurfaced, she stopped spinning with a flourish and sent the fireballs right back to it. "Keep up the pressure, everyone!"

"Congrats on your first Keyblade Formchange, Kairi!" Lambda initiated her own Formchange and sent her eight Petal Blades out to skewer the Dark Inferno, giving Xion time to close in and continue the combo.

The Dark Inferno tried to cross its swords and block again, but Xion wasn't so easy to deflect. She used the momentum from rebounding off the boss' defenses to execute her unique offensive reprisal. "I should come up with a name for that move. Counter Lunge, maybe?" She tabled the thought as she continued attacking, until the boss flashed and escaped again.

The Dark Inferno's swords now turned red as it powered itself up further, and it immediately launched into a vicious, all-out combo, occasionally flashing and using its sudden bursts of momentum to switch targets. Only Kairi had much success weathering the assault, since her Dual Fans were primarily defense-oriented. Each swish and spin of her fans produced a wall of pink-hued wind that could repel swords and redirect spells.

The rest of Kairi's team had been knocked to the ground by the Dark Inferno, so Kairi decided it was time to finish the fight. A spotlight shone down on her as her dancing picked up speed and energy, forming a mighty cyclone that briefly obscured her from view. Glowing petals began flying out of the cloud with all the speed and sharpness of shuriken, ripping the Dark Inferno apart. However, her allies were instead healed when the petals touched them - a little bit at a time that really added up from the sheer number of petals that were released. As the cyclone faded, Kairi struck a pose, and beams of pink Light rose up all around her, circling outward like a Faith spell and finishing off the boss while leaving her allies unharmed. Her Dual Fans then reverted to her Keyblade's normal form. "You've all been a wonderful audience!"

"You should call that one 'Miracle Dance'," Lambda suggested.

Kairi grinned. "Sure! I don't usually shout the names of my attacks unless it's part of a spell, though."

"But you do name 'em?" Lea asked.

The next battle started before Kairi could answer.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Skip to Floor 40..._

 _Defeat the Demon Towers!_

The next boss seemed to be two tall stacks of Shadows, endless hordes of tiny, weak Heartless climbing up each other and falling down the middle. One of the stacks suddenly emitted an aura of Darkness and began to twist and fly around like a single entity. Lea dove to the side to avoid it, while Lambda scanned these things. After ramming, the stack stopped moving around for a while.

"Target ID: _Demon Tower_. Collective physical power: A. Magic power: D. Defenses: B. There's definitely some kind of core inside the Towers, controlling these swarms of Shadows. Watch out, having a manager has made them scarily coordinated!"

"Let's _not_ wait for the cores to expose themselves." Kairi cast Aerora, blowing Shadows every which way off the stationary Tower...but there were just more Shadows underneath. "Geez, how many are there?"

"Analysis: more Shadows spawning at a rate of 13 per second. I guess this battle is supposed to simulate an enemy that can gather endless reinforcements straight from the Realm of Darkness."

"Then what the heck can we do?!" Xion dodged away from the second Tower

Lea was the one to answer, surprisingly. "Keep killing 'em until they back off. Any set of Shadows _could_ spawn indefinitely, but they never do. It's just how they work."

Kairi nodded and raised her Keyblade. "It's worth a shot. Let's just see if this works... Holy!" ***PSSSEEEEEEEWWWW!*** The beam of Light that crashed down from the ceiling did manage to smash one of the Demon Towers apart, but the Shadows just scattered and regrouped underneath Kairi, smacking her into the air. Then the stack somehow started flying around to go after her, but Xion drew its attention with a Fira spell.

Lambda cast Firaga, dividing the Heartless' attention further. "Analysis: Moderate damage inflicted. Looks like that spell wasn't _absolutely_ worse than useless." Suddenly, the other Demon Tower - which everyone had ignored - snuck up behind her and swallowed her whole!

"Oh, no! Lambda!" Kairi whacked the exterior of that Tower with her Keyblade, but it wasn't enough to make the Heartless spit out its soon-to-be meal.

 _"IDEA Engine, activate! Aeroga!"_ _*SHEENG!*_ A maelstrom of wind blew the Demon Tower apart from the inside, scattering the Shadows so badly that they lost their organization completely. Lambda was left in the middle, mostly unharmed. "...Phew. I don't know what I would've done if that wasn't a QC. Thundaga!" _*SHEENG!*_ "What? Two?!" A crackling storm of lightning struck every inch of the arena, making Lambda very glad that most magic didn't hurt one's allies as the scattered components of the Demon Tower were eradicated. "Firaga!" A normal Firaga launched at the remaining Tower, dealing moderate damage but not accomplishing anything special. "...Didn't think so." The green glow from the IDEA Engine faded.

Kairi raised her Keyblade. "Our teamwork can match that, I know it can! Xion, Aero with me on my mark! Three...two...one...Aeroga!"

"Aerora!" The combined spells managed to scatter the Demon Tower.

Kairi wasn't about to let the Shadows escape or reform. "And now...Thundaga!"

"Thundara!" Xion used her spell to cover a different area from Kairi, wiping out most of the remaining Shadows.

"Firaga! Firaga! FIRAZA!" Lea pulled an innovative trick, holding back a bit of the mana from each spell to fuel a stronger version than he could normally cast. The resulting explosion obliterated the last few Shadows, although it was much smaller than the one Lambda cast while battling the possessed Neuroi Hive's reinforcements.

Lambda resolved to mix that spellcasting trick into her own fighting style. "That was impressive, Lea! Where'd you learn to do that?"

"Instinct and experience, I guess? I've been in this business a decade longer than you. Got it memorized?"

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 41..._

 _Yet more battles!_

Everyone was pretty much tapped out for mana, but that wasn't much issue against the _Neoshadows_ in the next room. The team took it easy in the next few fights to be ready for another crazy boss battle.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 45..._

 _Defeat Azure Silhouettes: Set 1!_

The next arena was unusual: each member of the team found themselves cordoned off from the others by magic barriers, forcing them to each contend with their own enemy. A globe of deep blue energy waited in each mini-arena, which swiftly transformed into copies of people who didn't exist in the Heart Timeline.

Lambda stared down the copy of herself, except the duplicate was equipped with an IDEA Engine that replaced Lux Sanctus: Murakumo's Battle Mode. Having faced this enemy before and used all its moves herself, she didn't need to scan _Lambda-11 Mk. 2.0_. "How many times will I have to fight myself before this is all over? I guess this time, there's no other way out."

Kairi faced off against a woman with long hair as red as Axel's, wielding what looked like a weaponized book and quill pen. Unlike Lambda, Kairi didn't hear any voice putting a name to this new face. "Who are these people?"

Lambda summoned her Petal Blades and got into a blade lock with all eight of her enemy's floating swords, giving her time to scan the other enemies for her allies' sake. "These are all people from the Azure Timeline. Luckily, the data I received all at once from the Azure is ridiculously comprehensive compared to what I've had to gather bit by bit from Kingdom Hearts. Here's a rundown:

"Kairi, that's _Tsubaki Yayoi_. Her weapon, 'Sealed Weapon: Izayoi', can change into many different forms as it steals light from her surroundings and herself to power up its attacks. Defeat her before she does too much of that, or that weapon might interrupt Roxas from Observing Xion! That's its real purpose.

"Xion, that's _Relius Clover._ I know him too well; he's the one who designed me. His weaponized wife, _Detonator: Ignis_ , will attack alongside him. Watch out for crazy machines from under his cape. I didn't see much of his abilities the one time I faced him.

"Lea, it looks like you're fighting _BANG SHISHIGAMI!_ Apparently, his name is always in all caps because he shouts so much. He's a close-quarters attacker, but he has a limited number of nails that he can use as various projectiles. Watch out for his powerful grab moves. The data claims he's a ninja, but I just don't see it. Which might just mean he's even more ninja-like, who knows?

"As for you, _Lambda-11 Mk. 2.0_ , I don't need to scan you to know your name, your strengths...and your weaknesses." Lambda backed off from her replacement, and was ready when it used Act Parcer Zwei: Cavalier to follow her. It then brought all its Petal Blades down in successive overhead slashes, which was where Lambda exploited a weakness in its fighting style: Murakumo Units always swung all their Petals along the same line, as though wielding a single sword. Lambda snuck one of her own Petals away from the new blade lock and sent it to stab her copy. "Firaga!" By launching a fireball from the Petal Blade already impaled in the copy, Lambda dealt massive damage. The Azure Silhouette flickered like an old TV with a bad signal, then vanished entirely. "It looks like we only need to deal a little damage to beat these things!"

"That would be great if I could get past this lady's crazy shifting weapon!" Kairi's opponent was a skilled swordswoman, but that was the least of her worries. From moment to moment, Izayoi could transform from a short sword to a claymore to a mace to a spiked whip and back. And that was all independent of Tsubaki's floating shield, which formed a nigh-impenetrable defense. Kairi didn't even bother trying to cast Holy on this enemy, since she'd already seen Izayoi suck light (and capital-L Light) out of its surroundings to enhance Tsubaki's speed and striking power with her various special attacks. A divine laser from above would probably just power it up even further.

Frustrated with her inability to push back against Tsubaki's seemingly endless rushdown, Kairi changed her Keyblade into its new Dual Fans form and made use of the fans' defensive abilities. She managed to get Tsubaki off balance, but trying to strike back was about as effective as, well, slapping a soldier in the face with a paper fan. "Firaga!" Spellcasting mixed strangely with the new weapon, creating a brief whirlwind of fire around Kairi rather than a projectile fireball. However, that was just what she needed to get past Tsubaki's small shield. Now the fight was on Kairi's terms, and it only took a couple more close-range spells to put down the Azure Silhouette.

Xion was caught in a hectic, two-on-one melee, trying to defend against Ignis' extendable claws and the extendable arms from Relius' back. Luckily, after only a few volleys, Ignis seemed to overheat and temporarily shut down. Xion tried to use the opportunity to attack Relius, but he spun on one foot and seemed to phase through her attack, leaving her off balance. Then a giant fist the size of a motorcycle rose up from the ground beneath him - where did he keep all of these arms?! - and punched Xion through the air. She was lucky that Ignis was downed, or it would've followed up the attack.

"Fine, then! Let's see you dodge this!" Xion kept her distance and tightened her focus on her two targets. Orange energy gathered at the tip of her Keyblade as she charged up her copy of Sora's Ragnarok move, but as a Shotlock instead of as the built-in special move of her jaw-sword _Ouroboros_. Two dozen orange trails burst from her Keyblade, snaking through the air and exploding against her enemies. Try as he might, Relius couldn't use Led Ley to dodge forever, and Ignis had barely restarted itself before it was knocked out of commission again. The dual Azure Silhouette vanished.

Lea ducked in and out of melee combat against BANG SHISHIGAMI, matching his chakrams against the loud ninja's gauntlets. Unlike the other Azure Silhouettes, BANG SHISHIGAMI always shouted his attacks' names at maximum volume, which meant he could only surprise Lea with them once each. "HEAVENLY PHOENIX!" Case in point, Lea bent sideways as BANG SHISHIGAMI'S burning midair rush passed by him. The ex-Nobody tossed a chakram after the ninja, but BANG SHISHIGAMI bounced off a strange floating bumper he'd placed earlier - "SUPERSONIC!" - launching himself over the flying disk and back in Lea's direction. Lea found himself grabbed by a sweaty fist. "BANG TAIJUTSU: ULTIMATE! BANG! DROP!" Lea was punched skyward, then kicked further up, then punched back to the ground, only to land on BANG SHISHIGAMI'S raised fist.

"Ow...for a sweaty oaf who's as dumb as a bag of nails, this guy can really fight!" Lea backed away and focused on throwing chakrams from a distance, but BANG SHISHIGAMI blocked one with a glowing gauntlet and vanished, reappearing behind Lea.

"BANG'S SHADOWSTEP JUTSU!" Luckily, this was the most predictable new trick BANG SHISHIGAMI had used yet, and Lea managed to block the burning punch with his other chakram. Shifting to his Keyblade, Lea retaliated with a heavy swing and cast Thunder for a guaranteed hit.

"Hmm...I bet these Azure Timeline guys don't have much resistance to our timeline's magic. Bind!" Just as Lea predicted, BANG SHISHIGAMI was caught by the staticky field and was left unable to move or teleport away. "Gotcha now!" Lea shifted back to his chakrams and pummeled his adversary with fiery disks that curved around BANG SHISHIGAMI'S guard.

The ninja tried to toss an umbrella full of nails over Lea's head: "BANG'S STEEL RAIN!" but the final Azure Silhouette vanished before the umbrella could open up.

After that tough set of solo battles, the return to standard Heartless hordes for the next four floors was a welcome change of pace.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Floor 50..._

 _Defeat the Iron Imprisoner IV!_

"What the heck? That's not a Heartless!" Lambda scanned the huge, demonic-looking enemy, which seemed content to just float menacingly in the center of the arena for the first few moments of the battle. "Scan complete. Enemy class: _Unversed_. Target name: _Iron Imprisoner IV_. Apparently there were three other variants, but we get to only fight the strongest one. Lucky us... Physical strength: S. Magical strength: S. Defenses: A. It mainly uses fire to attack via explosive teleports and that giant hammer, but it doesn't seem to be immune to fire. Here we go!"

The boss finally started attacking by spinning its massive, flaming maul around in circles and zooming around the arena. Team Kairi scattered in all directions, barely avoiding the first rush. After three changes of direction, the Iron Imprisoner scattered flames all across the arena. This arena was just a bit too small to keep running from its attacks; the team had to Cure themselves after weathering the assault.

"Blizzaga!" Kairi's spell did some damage, but the Unversed didn't react to the hit at all. Instead, it spun around and somehow drilled its way underground. A tremor heralded its return under Kairi's feet, which thankfully helped her time a Reflega spell to avoid damage and counterattack. She got some distance from the boss as quickly as possible, which turned out to be a good idea when it suddenly exploded!

A trail of embers snaked from the site of the explosion to the other side of the arena, where the boss reappeared. A vortex inside its hollow hammer started sucking everyone closer as the boss prepared to explode again, so Lambda equipped her Glider to fight its pull. Her allies linked hands with her and tried to hold their ground, which slowed their approach just enough to avoid the blast. The boss then continued teleporting and dragging the team around two more times, preventing them from doing much to retaliate, before vanishing entirely and filling the room with a red haze.

Suddenly, the boss reappeared, looking around in confusion. Apparently, that attack relied on some part of the environment that wasn't present in this arena.

"Holy!" ***PSSSEEEEEEEWWWW!*** Kairi wasn't expecting the spell to do much damage, but it did finally cause the boss to stagger as she moved in for a rising corkscrew attack. She kicked off its chest and launched another Blizzaga spell as she bounced away. Lea picked up the assault with several throws of his chakrams while Lambda traced lines across it with her Braid Beam. Kairi cheered, "Keep it up, everyone! It keeps staggering every time we hit it with a strong attack!" Unfortunately, she was out of mana for the moment, so she wasn't able to contribute much more pressure against the boss.

Xion had been hanging back, charging another Ragnarok. She unleashed it successfully, but she was surprised at how much it took out of her to cast even two Shotlocks without a break. Still, she rushed after her orange trails to deliver some heavy melee attacks as the magic blasts exploded all over the boss.

The giant Unversed finally succumbed to the assault and dissolved into wisps of Darkness that started to trail away to somewhere before bursting into Merlin's signature magic smoke puffs.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Second Quarter Rest Area..._

The team reappeared in another break room, similar to the previous one except for its fancier, silver-colored furniture. "We did it, everyone! What a day!" Kairi dropped into one of the four cushy chairs set at the middle table and picked out a bite-sized chocolate from the platter sitting there.

"Ooh, chocolate!" Lambda immediately started popping chocolates into her mouth one after the other.

"All those battles really add up!" Xion took a moment to catch her breath and sip some fruit punch. "But we really learned a lot, didn't we?"

"Yeah, we've got all kinds of new powers now!" Lea agreed with his mouth full, between sips of punch and bites of chocolate.

 _"I wish I could've been more helpful,"_ Namine wistfully mentioned.

Kairi assured her, "You did fine! If it wasn't for you, the Eye of Darkness would've got the drop on us. And you made sure I didn't slip on any bananas from the _Bouncywilds_ on Floor 42." Kairi always made sure to keep track of all the ways Namine helped out, and this training exercise was no exception.

Lambda asked, "Now that we've made it this far, should we keep going to the top of the Arena Pillar, or move on to the next Training World?"

Kairi thought about it. "Actually, I think we should leave to check on Sora and the others. I bet they're ready for us by now."

Lambda nodded. "That, or you're underestimating the time dilation effect over this place, but sure, we can head back to the real world for a while."

"Sounds like a plan," Lea agreed. "I don't think I could stand more arena battles right now, anyway."

"I wonder what Mickey wanted to tell Riku?" Xion mused. Now that everyone agreed, they all vanished from the Rest Area and reappeared back in the central Hub of the Training Worlds.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _Training Worlds: Hub..._

Roxas was waiting for them, as usual. "Congratulations on reaching Floor 50, everyone! If you go back through the door you just left, you'll be brought right to Floor 51 to continue your challenge. Or, if you want to continue your adventure in the Training Worlds, you can go through the next door..." He gestured at the next door in line:

 _Training World 6:_

 _Kagutsuchi_

Lambda stared at the name on the door. "I now regret our decision to hold off on further training. But we _did_ already make that decision, so I suppose we're not going to go explore the Azure Timeline right now."

Roxas explained, "Just as you suspect, Lambda, through that door is a recreation of a series of important events in the Azure Timeline. A few things had to be changed, but you'd be following in the footsteps of the 'Grim Reaper' as he made his way to the top of the 13th Hierarchical City Kagutsuchi to try and destroy the Cauldron hidden there. Honestly, I didn't pay much attention to the books Merlin left about the world government and history of the Azure Timeline, but I bet Lambda will be able to fill you all in on the important parts. That is, if you ever come back to train again..."

Namine replied, _"I'm sure Sora would love to visit this new world; we should bring him here if we run into Merlin while traveling together, Kairi!"_

Xion nodded, although she knew that Team Kairi would be split up from here on, and they probably wouldn't all be in the same place very often. She hoped there was a way to keep in touch...

Just in case they didn't get a chance later, Kairi pulled everyone in for a group hug farewell, dragging Roxas and Lea into the embrace as well. "I guess Team Kairi is officially disbanded for now. But if the opportunity ever arises, I'd love to fight alongside all of you again!"

Lea sniffled and wiped a tear from his eye. "Okay, that's enough of the sappy goodbyes. Let's...just go." He broke away from the hug first and stepped into the magic bubble in the middle of the Hub.

Lambda broke away from the hug. "Yeah. We all have Keyblades; there's no way to keep us from meeting again. Have fun with your own teams!" She passed through the bubble.

"I hope Hazama won't be too upset that he missed this session," Kairi mused as she, too, left the Training Worlds.

"Well then...shall we?" Roxas offered his arm, and Xion linked hers through it as they passed through the bubble together.

 **VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV**

 _A/N: And so, another book of the_ Time Break Saga _comes to a close._

 _This story was never meant to be more than an interim situation to get everyone in place for the next and possibly final book in the series. Everyone has grown much stronger and more capable with their Keyblades, which is exactly why they needed this training in the first place. Now they're ready to rejoin their friends and loved ones as Xehanort's newest plan casts a dark cloud on the horizon._

 _Don't worry, we have Gummiphones now. You can't have a game or game-based fanfiction nowadays without some way to take selfies, so everyone will be keeping in touch as we move on to the next book:_ Clear Skies _. Not to be confused with_ Blue Skies _, the one-shot compilation within this 'verse that's currently lying dormant on my profile._

 _A big thanks to everyone for sticking with this series so long! Holy lasers, it's been more than five years since I posted the first chapter of_ Dark Clouds _! That's partly because I update so slowly, of course. And I know I haven't been able to please everyone, particularly since it's abundantly clear that I can't write a decent tragedy to save my scruffy neck. Of course, if you wanted to feel bad over Kingdom Hearts, you could just play the horribly paced narrative train wreck that is KH3._

 _An extra-special thanks to The Mighty Gyarapie for always reminding me to update. Thanks a bunch! Love you, bro!_

 _As always, I really enjoyed my PM conversations with Titano Man XIII. You helped me get my thoughts together, and I can always count on you to respond constructively and/or encouragingly to my writing!_

 _There are a bunch of other people who favorited, followed, and/or left reviews as I worked on this story. Every single notification gives me a nice warm fuzzy feeling. Thank you all for your support! Even you, angry "Ultra Beast" guest reviewer person. I did mostly deserve your criticism, as noted above, but I still contend that that is exactly how all Stop magic works, Stopza included._

 _I'm going to do my best to improve the flow of the story, give all of the teams and minor characters enough time in the spotlight (including the Final Fantasy characters in Radiant Garden, where Team Roxas will be spending a lot of time), absolutely avoid Kairi's lamentable canon fate, let Lambda keep throwing new ideas at the multiverse until something sticks, and just generally create my best version of KH3. And of course, we can't count the Azure Timeline or its refugees out just yet, either. I hope you all look forward to it!_


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